New Beginnings
by Sephraim Annatau
Summary: Everyone agrees, one Kirk is bad enough, two is asking for trouble. But what happens when it can't be helped? Will it spell total disaster or will it be a blessing in disguise? Naw, no way! And what about the pretty, young Aunt who comes too? And how the Heck does someone stop attracting the attention of a curious Vulcan Science officer? SpockxOC beginning of KirkxUhura
1. Prologue

Summery:

 _Everyone agrees, one Kirk is bad enough, two is asking for trouble. But what happens when it can't be helped? Will it spell total disaster or will it be a blessing in disguise? Naw, no way! And what about the pretty, young Aunt who comes too? And how the Heck does someone stop attracting the attention of a Vulcan Science officer? SpockxOC beginning of KirkxUhura_

 _A/N: As this is my first fan-fic please be kind. I am dyslexic so if you see a spelling errors please let me know. My story is also unbeta-ed so my mistakes are my own. Also, if you have any ideas that you think would be cool to incorporate please let me know as it's always helpful to have more ideas, even if I don't use them right away._

 _Thanks for reading!_

 _Sephraim Annatau_

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Trek, if I did things would be different, and Spock would be both snarky and sarcastic.**

Prologue

"When's Mommy coming home," a small girl asked the young woman standing next to her; she couldn't be more than five years old. "Aunt Seph," She asked looking up at the woman "is everything ok? Is Mommy ok?" her voice shook a little as she asked about her mother.

"It will be, sweetheart, it will be," her aunt said sadly looking into the distance "Soon," she whispered her voice breaking a little as she spoke "but mommy…" her voice completely broke leaving her unable to finish the sentence.

Somehow the girl knew her mommy wasn't coming home anymore. She also knew her aunt was really sad and hurting. Mommy had always told her that her hugs always made her feel better, so she reasoned that it would also make her aunt feel better too, that's how it worked, right? She wasn't too sure, but it made sense so it had to work. She didn't want her aunt to continue to be sad, because it made her sad.

So she did what she reasoned would help her aunt, she wrapped her little arms around her hips, as she wasn't tall enough to reach her waist yet.

"It's ok, Aunt Seph," she said, her voice slightly muffled from having her face pressed against her aunt "We'll make do. If you need help just ask me. Mommy always called me her big-helper-girl. I know I can help you, too."

Her aunt looked down at her smiling softly at her earnest words. Slowly she knelt down to better hug her niece. They stayed like that for a few minutes as her aunt gathered the strength to face the world. A few moments after she strengthened her resolve she pulled back a bit and looked at her niece.

"Dasa," she hesitantly began.

"Yes," the girl prompted. As her aunt hesitated a bit more the girl had a panicked thought race through her mind. _Aunt Seph wants to get rid of me, nobody want to keep me!_ _No!_ She instantly squashed that thought, _Aunt Seph helped raise me, and she's like a second mother to me. She would never want to get rid of me unless it was for the best! It has to be something else._ She glanced up at her aunt, _but what?_ She questioned.

Her aunt took a deep breath and staring at her niece finally asked, "How would you like to live with your father?"

It took several heartbeats for that to settle in, but when it did…

"I have a Dad?!" she shrieked at her aunt in disbelief, shock clear on her face.

"Yes," her aunt said slowly not knowing how she'll respond to this new news, as her mother specifically asked that unless it was very important or if her daughter was in danger, her younger sister was not allowed to tell either her daughter of the father that the other existed.

The look of fear that crossed the child's face broke her heart and the question that followed it even more so.

"Will he want me?" she asked her aunt.

"If what your mother told me is true then yes, sweety, he will. She's told me a lot of times that he had told her that he wanted children."

"Then why wasn't he part of my life?" she desperately wanted to know.

"Dasa," her aunt said sadly "He didn't know you existed. Your mother never told him, as he was entering Starfleet and she didn't want to hold him back. She was very sorry she didn't tell him but she always wanted to tell him she just didn't know how. And as you got older she thought that he had moved on and," she sighed "how would you tell a man you haven't spoken to in three and a half years that 'oh by the way, you have a kid you didn't know about'. Is that how you'd do it? How would you respond to that?"

After a moment of silence the woman spoke, "I'm sorry. I know this is hard on you too. Will you forgive me?"

"I forgive you," she hesitated "and if you think he'd like me, I'd be ok with living with him as long as you're with me too."

The skeptic look on her aunt's face made her giggle a bit. "Sweetheart," she said with a reproving tone "you and your dad are so similar that you have to get along. Though," she paused as her niece held her breath "I'm not so sure that Starfleet won't have problems with two of you on one starship." Her aunt looked at her with wide eyes, "Oh my gosh-a-billies, that's just asking for a disaster with you two on a ship together!"

She giggled some more watching her aunt through her eyelashes. "If you think Starfleet would let us I'm ok with living on a starship."

"I'm sure they'd let us."


	2. In Which Starfleet Just Asks for Trouble

**A/N: My characters may seem slightly OOC at times, so if you see anything you think is not normal for them please let me know and give me a reason you think that as well as a different way to portray the same thing but in a more their character way. I will not be putting the disclaimer in every chapter since you read it in the first, so why waste everyone's time and put it in every chapter. Thank you all who are following this story as it makes me think that I'm not just wasting my time. Please reveiw. And have a great day!-Seph**

Chapter Two: In Which Starfleet Just Asks for Trouble

At first glance the bridge of the Enterprise seems quiet, too quiet. Yet everyone is furiously working on something that doesn't allow them much room for "fun". In the center of the bridge setting in the Captain's chair is a young man who is furiously glaring at the PADD in his hands as he is working on something. Everyone on the bridge gives him and occasional amused glance save the Vulcan Science officer who is working on some "random" project of his. The perfect quiet of the bridge is suddenly broken as with a yell of frustration the captain flings himself out of his chair as he starts to swear at the "Stupid report" he was writing damning it "to hell and back" for the horror it is making his life.

The Vulcan officer watches the captain as he paces; waving his PADD around, almost losing his grip on it and having it fly out of his hand, as he uses his very extensive and very colorful vocabulary from quite a few languages and cultures. Though he finds it quite odd that more or less the only things his captain remembers from the occasional language lessons he has received from Lieutenant Uhura when they had to deal with other cultures for missions that where given to them from Starfleet were their swear words and how to best insult them with as few words as possible in all ways possible. Finally he broke the captain's tirade against the "stupid report" with some words he knew the captain didn't want to hear.

"Captain, I did advise you to write the report the day after the incident, which if you recall was almost a week ago, yet you were the one that chose not to with the reasoning that you would have time to complete it before we returned to earth," he spoke with what most would hear as a monotonous voice "If you did not want this outcome you should have written it when you were advised to write it. However," he continues only to be stopped by the captain raising one hand in an attempt to forestall his logic, and the words he _really_ didn't want to hear.

"Spock," he interrupts with a pained expression.

Spock merely raises an eyebrow and slightly tilts his head to show that he's listening.

The captain continues what he had started to say as he starts to wave his PADD around again in an attempt to get his point across to his very logical First Officer. "Please, whatever you do, don't say 'I told you so'. I'm getting enough of that from Bones. And how many times do I have to tell you to call me Jim! Kirk will also do, just please stop calling me captain all the time, it's annoying." Kirk ends with a plaintive tone as he really _does_ find it annoying whenever his crew only calls him "captain", especially when they're talking to him, he does have a name after all.

He flops into his chair with a huff before he glances at Spock again. "Hey Spock," he asks before pausing to see if he's actually listening, as one time he started to speak to him just to find out that Spock thought he was talking to Bones even when Bones wasn't on the bridge. When he turned around to look at him again, he continued, "How would you like it if I only called you 'First Officer' or 'Commander' whenever I was referring to you?"

"As I am your First Officer and a Commander it would be logical to refer to me by my rank and title, and as I have mentioned before, I am Vulcan I do not feel frustration or annoyance from your actions."

"Ok, _Commander_ ," Kirk responds with a smirk "Just remember to drop the smug tone and I'd believe you were more unemotional like you want everyone to believe."

As he finished speaking, Kirk spun his chair around to face the front of the bridge, so subsequently he missed the flash of annoyance that that appeared in Spock's eyes before he suppressed it. Kirk sighed as he stared at his PADD with a forlorn look on his face causing many of the other officers on the bridge to be forced to stifle their snickers so as not to annoy their captain any farther than he already is.

Quiet returns to the bridge for another ten or so minutes before the bridge doors slide open with a hiss letting in the Chief Medical Officer Leonard McCoy or Bones as Kirk loves to call him just to annoy him. McCoy moves toward the Captain's chair with a grin and opens his mouth to say something to Kirk, but before he can say anything Kirk pulls himself out of the chair muttering about getting some "fresh air" before dejectedly moving off the bridge with a "Spock, you have the Comm" thrown over his shoulder.

McCoy looks around the bridge with confusion before asking, "What the hell's wrong with him?"

A few snickers meet his worried question. Before he turns to the one he knows he'll get a complete answer from.

"Spock," he asked giving his favorite "hobgoblin" a glare. Although he'd never admit it he really did like Spock, he just didn't like his lack of emotion, or rather his supposed lack of emotions.

"The captain is only struggling to complete the reports he has only just begun today before we reach earth in 3.92 hours."

"Wait," McCoy interjected with an incredulous expression "Jim just started his reports today?! What the hell is he thinking! Doesn't he know that those reports take more than ten hours to complete?!" However, before he could really say much on his thought about his friend's stupidity and questionable sanity, he is interrupted by Spock.

"I cannot tell you what the captain was thinking as for that you must ask him. However, I have noticed that he seems to be highly distracted at the present. As the CMO it is your duty to insure the health of the crew and that includes the captain. Therefore I will leave you to do your duty"

* * *

McCoy finally finds Kirk sitting in an empty observation room staring blankly out at the stars as they flew by. McCoy could tell that his friend wasn't even aware of what is happening around him just from his eyes. They were so blank, empty, and lifeless, it hurt to see such a look in his eyes. It looked to him like Kirk had lost something very important, something that gave him the will to live. Finally deciding that Kirk really needs to finish his reports before they get to earth, which would be in about an hour, he decided to step into Kirk's private moment. _I'm not like Spock_ , he thought to himself, _I can't keep track of time to the "3.93" hours or whatever it was he said. It's enough to make anyone frustrated to no end!_

"Jim," McCoy said quietly to him, in an effort to get his attention.

"What is it Bones," Kirk responded in a sad tone.

"What's the matter? Normally you are borderline hyper from excitement in getting another terrifying mission, but you're sitting here moping about something. What's wrong?" McCoy hoped that if he pushed Kirk enough that in a fit of annoyance he'd let what's bothering him slip out in an attempt to prove that nothing is wrong with him.

Kirk sighed, something McCoy hadn't heard from him since he had been working on his method to cheat the Kobayashi Maru, which everyone in Starfleet knew kinda-sorta backfired on him.

"Jim," he tried again.

"Hey Bones," Kirk interrupted him; "you lost someone you cared about, yeah?"

All McCoy could do was nod, as he was uncertain where this question was going.

The earnest look on Kirk's face when he turned to look at him was not something McCoy was expecting to see, nor were his words to follow.

"How do you deal with the memories? Can… You know what? It's not important. Sorry to waste your precious time." He rose to leave stopping at the door to turn around and speak again, "I'll see you when we dock."

The hiss of the door closing sounded loud to McCoy as he sat there, mind blank, trying to process what Kirk had said.

"What the hell?" echoed quietly in the empty room

* * *

"Thank you for meeting me Admiral," the young woman said as she sat down across from the new head of Starfleet, as the position was now filled after Admiral Marcus's death.

"It was no trouble," he responded smiling at her. As he examined her he thought, _she can't be older then sixteen, what's she doing here? She said it was important, But…_

She interrupted his thoughts as she bravely stated her request. "Admiral, my older sister recently died from an accident leaving me in charge of her daughter's care," for a moment she faltered giving the Admiral opportunity to ask the question on his mind.

"How old are you?" The slight panicked look on her face made him wonder what her problem with his question was.

"I-I'm-I'm sorry," she said looking down at her hands. She was griping them fairly hard. "I'm only seventeen and a half. And by the time I'm legally old enough to be her guardian," she hesitated again as she looked at the Admiral with pleading eyes, "It will be too late. She'll be taken away put somewhere I won't find her and," Her voice cracked a bit "I promised my sister, Chayah that I'd take care of her. But I'm not old enough and Hadassah needs her father, so I wanted to ask if it's possible for us to be put on the same starship with him." She rushed on before the Admiral could say anything hoping that if he heard everything he'd say yes. "I can take care of Dasa while he's working, and as for why he's not involved in his daughter's life. Chayah didn't tell him she existed so he doesn't know about her, but his name is on her birth certificate." At the Admiral's stunned expression from the last bit of news, she felt she had to ask again. "Please, let her be with her dad. Please."

The Admiral sighed, "Ok, just tell me who her father is and I'll arrange it. Families should be together no matter what."

Her gratitude could only be explained by two words. "Thank you."

* * *

"Are we there yet," Kirk whined yet again from the Captain's Chair.

"Jim," McCoy exploded at him, "Stop behaving like a child. You're the Captain act like it!"

"But that's no fun," he continued whining as he spun his chair around and around. No one knew what had happened after Kirk had left the bridge but whatever it was it seemed to have brought him back to his normal self.

"Are we there yet?" He asked again with a smirk knowing it annoyed McCoy to no end.

"Why you little…" McCoy growled as he started toward Kirk looking like he'd strangle him before Spock interjected.

"Captain, you have repeated that question twenty-three times. It is illogical to repeat it once more as we can still see Earth's space docks. Therefore you can judge for yourself how long we have until we dock based off of how long it took us to get this far."

The murmur of twenty-three and "he counted all of them" moved around the bridge as everyone there just stared at Spock for what felt like the hundred-gazillianth time since the launch of the Enterprise.

"Twenty-thr- Spock," Kirk said incredulously, staring at him just like all the others were, "You counted all of them?"

"How did you keep track of them," McCoy asked dumbfounded "I lost track after the second time."

"It was not difficult. If you continue to have difficulties I can give you mental exercises to enhance and improve you memory retention."

"Spock," Kirk said raising a hand to forestall his response. _I've been doing that a lot now_ , he mused to himself. "Don't you have a 'random' project you are working on?"

"It is not random, Captain," Spock stated flatly, "I am merely testing…"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Kirk jumped in stopping him again, "like I said, 'random'. You don't really _need_ to do it. Hence, random project."

"I think you have a wrong definition of random, Jim," McCoy grumbled under his breath.

"Docking procedure complete," Sulu stated fighting a grin. He always found it humorous watching Kirk, Spock, and McCoy go at it like they just did.

"Really," Kirk popped up next to him, surprise written on his face, "We're already there? But I wanted to ask 'are we there yet' some more," he whined the last part.

"Jim," McCoy said in exasperation "You're such a kid."

Kirk smirked at him and shot back, "But you still love me."

"Don't know why," McCoy muttered under his breath his eyes rolling skyward.

Spock merely raised an eyebrow at their interaction. Observing human interactions were always fascinating to him.

"Captain," Uhura piped up from the communication console, "We just received a message from Starfleet. They said that we have two passengers that will be living on board for an unknown amount of time. We are supposed to make them feel welcomed and at home."

"Great," Kirk interjects happily, "when do they get here?"

"Um," Uhura looks at Kirk with a frown on her face as the bridge doors hiss open, "According to the message they're already here."

At that everyone looks toward the door that had opened to reveal a young woman and a little girl. The silence is suddenly broken as the little girl pipes up with an enthusiastic "Hi Daddy!"

 **Buh-buh-buhm *drum roll* CLIFF HANGER!**


	3. In Which Kirk Hopes He's Dreaming

**A/N: One more chapter here. And remember to not get too use to me posting them so quickly, it's just that my brain is feeding me the story so quickly I have to get it out. I also hope you enjoy Hadassah as she is actually based off of me from when I was really little.**

 **Thank you Superstar072299 for your review, I really do appreciate it. And I hope this chapter helps explain the direction I'm planning on taking better.**

 **Thank you all who are following this story, it help me to believe that I do have good story ideas.**

 **Oh and Please, oh Please review. I think I'm going to term myself as a Review Monster as I feel like "Reviews!" *nom-nom-nom***

 **Have a great day, and thanks for reading-Seph**

 **PS. My OC is based off of me so that's why she has my name. ;)**

* * *

Chapter Three: In Which Kirk Hopes He's Dreaming

After the girl enthusiastically said "Hi Daddy", everyone wanted to know if she really was serious in thinking her dad was on the bridge, or if it was a joke.

Kirk finally snapped his gaze from the kid to the woman behind her. He knew her, but why was she here and who was this kid who seemed to think one of them was her dad? _Enough_ , he thought to himself, _she'll just have to explain what the hell is going on_.

"Seph, who is this kid and what the f-"

"Watch your language, Jim," she cut in sharply before he could finish his word. She sighed and looked at him sadly, "If you give me a moment I will explain. Afterward you can yell all you want, as long as you watch your language, and please Jim, don't interrupt me."

"Fine," he said crossing his arms, "please, procced."

"Ok," she sighed and began. "For those of you who don't know me, my name is Sephraim, and this is my niece Hadassah. Hadassah is five," she cut a sharp look at Kirk, "and if you give me a minute I'll tell you which one of my siblings she belongs to. To explain how Jim and I know each other, Jim was engaged to my older sister Chayah. That was before he joined Starfleet. Chayah has one fault that always got her into trouble,"

"She let others pursue their goals even if it hurt her," Kirk cut in with a fond smile. He then stopped and looked at Seph, "What does that have to do with why you're here?"

"To continue," Seph said giving Kirk a glare, "When Jim wanted to join Starfleet, Chayah let him go and she more or less dumped him in order to force him into Starfleet, knowing he wouldn't do it otherwise."

"Wait, that's why she did that?!" Kirk exploded.

"Jim!" Seph shouted at him, "You agreed to not interrupt."

"Sorry," he said sheepishly.

A few snickers could be heard around the bridge. Seph sighed and glanced around. She saw that almost all were trying to hide their grins from the comedy playing out in front of them but some weren't succeeding at all. She knew that the next part of her explanation would either cause trouble and/or hurt Jim very much. Still she knew she had to continue.

"After Jim was accepted to the Academy Chayah found that she was pregnant." Seph took a deep breath before plunging into the rest. "Jim, Hadassah is your daughter. Chayah didn't want you to know as she knew you would leave Starfleet and she didn't want that. But last week Chayah was in an accident and died, so if you don't take Hadassah she will be put in the system and you know very well what would happen then. And as I'm not old enough to raise her myself you have to take her. Please, Jim," She begged, "Don't let Hadassah be put in the system."

"Chayah's dead?" Kirk asked his voice breaking.

"Yes, Jim," Seph said brokenly, "But what will you do with your daughter."

"I" Kirk stopped and looked at her, "can I have some time to process this?"

"Sure, Starfleet doesn't need your answer for another forty-eight hours."

"Thanks, Seph," Kirk said as he walked off the bridge.

* * *

Many crewmembers find it odd as they watch their captain wonder the halls. Especially with "take off", as he likes to call it, so near. What they don't know is the maze his thoughts seem to be running through.

 _Chayah's dead. She's gone. I'll never see her again. I thought I could find a way to get back together with her. Now she left me with a kid, and I never knew about her_. Kirk paused in his walking, a look of panic etched on his face. _I have a kid. I have a… I have a… I- I… How…?_ And with that his thoughts shatter into a mass of incoherent pieces and he really starts to panic. _I don't know the first thing about how to take care of a kid! I don't know what she likes, what she hates, her best subject in school, what grade she's in, or even her full name! Someone help me! I don't know what to do! How can I even be her dad let alone a good dad and not know these things? What do I do?!_ And with those thoughts Kirk goes into a full blown panic attack.

* * *

Meanwhile, on the bridge…

"Does daddy not want me," Hadassah asked with a trembling lip.

To Spock it seemed like everyone froze for 54.21 seconds after her question. Finally it was Uhura that jumped up and solved the problem created from her question, as Sephraim was still struggling to get her emotions under control after her explanation to captain Kirk as to why she and Hadassah would be on the Enterprise for an unknown amount of time.

Uhura bent down and wrapped her arms around Hadassah in a tight hug. "No sweetie," she said with a shake of her head, "He does want you here, he just needs some time to sort out what he just learned that's all."

"But why," Hadassah wanted to know.

"Well," Uhura began, "When did you learn you had a daddy?"

"This morning before we got here, but I've always wanted one and now I do have a daddy!" Hadassah finished her sentence with a bright smile telling them just how happy she is with having a daddy for the first time in her life.

"Wait," Uhura stopped her, "you just learned about him today?"

"I," Seph interjected, "I didn't want to get her hopes up until I got the ok from Starfleet, and I got it just before she woke up this morning. So, I didn't tell her until this morning. And the Admiral said that you were leaving to go on another mission soon, so we had to hurry if we wanted to go with you."

"We had to leave everything behind," Hadassah said with plenty excitement, bouncing a bit before her face fell for as she said, "I had to leave daddy behind. But that's ok, I've got a real daddy now."

"Daddy?" everyone wanted to know.

Seph smiled fondly at Hadassah laughing softly as she explained. "Dasa named one of her teddies' 'daddy' so the other kids in the neighborhood would stop picking on her for not having a daddy like they did. After she named him daddy she would tell the other kids that she 'did too have a daddy, and he was at home with mommy'. They never did quite believe her, but it stopped the bulling, and the best part was that she was not even four yet and she found a way to stop them, just like her dad."

"Wait," Hadassah broke in, "I'm just like daddy?!"

"Yep," McCoy said, "sound like something Jim would do."

"So," Hadassah said slowly, "does that mean I can captain this ship, go on missions, save the world, blow bad guys up, and get some hot dates, too?"

The laughter that followed her question didn't die down for several minutes, leaving everyone, but Spock, out of breath, as Spock didn't join in with their laughter.

"She is definitely Jim's kid." McCoy said after a moment still laughing.

The scowl on her face looked so much like one Kirk would ware when they would tease him that it sent them back into another long fit of laughter.

Hadassah crossed her arms scowl still in place, looking even more like her dad that the bridge crew found it even funnier and slightly scary, too, as one Kirk is bad enough, but two is just asking for trouble.

With a huff Hadassah plopped herself into the Captain's chair shooting glares at everyone around her only to be interrupted in her tantrum that was so much like the one Kirk threw on their way back they just couldn't help laughing even more.

"Out of the chair," Spock said interrupting her small tantrum with the words he had spoken to Kirk when they were dealing with Nero.

Hadassah's response though was very different then her dad's. All she did when Spock told her to get out of the chair was, to stick her tongue out at him, and make herself more comfortable in it, as if saying 'I dare you to make me move'.

While fighting a smile, Uhura knelt down in front of Hadassah forcing her to break her staring contest with Spock that was really one sided, as he wasn't playing with her and didn't even know that they were playing a game.

"Hadassah," she began when she saw that she had the girl's attention, "How would you like to go and ask your dad if he wants you to stay on the Enterprise with us?"

Hadassah's face brightened for a moment before it fell into a thoughtful look. "I would like that, but do you even know where he is. Cause this ship is _humongous_ , and I don't know where to look first. Do you?"

Uhura just gave her a sly smile and asked the computer for the location of the captain, all the while watching Hadassah's eyes get bigger and bigger when the computer gave them the location of Kirk.

"Well, what are we waiting for," she finally burst as she jumped from the Captain's chair looking exactly like Kirk when he gets impatient that it threatened to send the bridge crew back into fits of laughter. "Let's go!" Hadassah yelled as she dragged Uhura behind her. The bridge door finally hiss shut behind them when suddenly the bridge was filled with everyone's, but Spock's, laughter.

Spock just cocked and eyebrow, internally acknowledging the success of Uhura's method to get Hadassah out of the Captain's chair. He glanced at the aunt noting that she wasn't joining in with the laughter but rather smiling sadly, a sheen of tears in her eyes as she was looking at the floor gently biting her bottom lip. Spock took the moment he had to properly observe her as he had learned that humans find it both uncomfortable and awkward to be observed by another. She wasn't short but she wasn't tall either, his estimation was that she would reach about shoulder height to him. She had medium brown hair with what looked to be natural golden highlights. Her hair was up in a small bun so he couldn't really tell how long it was. From his angle he also couldn't see her eyes very well, but she had a pleasant face. It was slightly rounded, with some cute freckles smattering her skin, wait what was he thinking, that thought wasn't very Vulcan, so why did he think it? _Alright, back to finishing my observation then I'm done_ , Spock thinks to himself. He had seen that she has a sweet smile, _but how can she smile like that after losing her sister_? He mused; _perhaps there is something else I don't know about her, something more internal? She is a beautiful woman, very ascetically pleasing. Gah, Spock what are you thinking! I defiantly need to meditate longer tonight._ He glanced at his console in an attempt to focus his thoughts off of the aunt. _Seph_ , he reminded himself, _she told us to call her Seph. But the moment I do that I may not be able to distance myself from her. Sheesh, what am I thinking, I'm a Vulcan, I can control myself no matter what._ Glancing back up at her he saw that she was looking at him. She opened her mouth to ask something when he remembered that no one had been introduced to her.

"If I may," Spock began, getting everyone's attention, "I am Commander Spock; I am the First Officer and Chief Science Officer. This," he said motioning to each person as he introduced them, "Is Doctor McCoy, he is the Chief Medical Officer; Lieutenant Sulu, our piolet; Ensign Chekov, on navigation; Lieutenant Uhura is with your niece, she is our Communications Officer; Engineer Scott is down in engineering, and is the Chief engineer. You already know Captain Kirk. The other crewmembers will introduce themselves when you meet them. However, at the moment you only need to know the command crew."

McCoy cuts in once Spock was done introducing everyone Seph. "Engineer Scott," McCoy said giving Spock a pointed look, "prefers if you call him Scotty, and you'll hear Jim call me Bones, so if you hear either of those you now know who people are talking about."

"Why does Jim call you Bones," Seph asked curiously looking at McCoy.

"I think he refers to something I said in our conversation we had when we'd just met."

Now Seph looked very curious. "What'd you say?"

"Eh," McCoy said scratching the back of his head, "I had just had a divorce and I decided to join Starfleet and I told Jim I had 'nothing but my Bones' left, so I guess he just started calling me Bones because of that."

Seph giggled, "That sounds like something Jim would do."

Spock decided he liked her giggle as it was soft and sweet, _just like her_ , he thought. _Stupid,_ he internally berated himself; _Vulcans control their emotions and thoughts not the other way around. I need to get myself under control._

* * *

Kirk stood staring out one of the viewports trying to sort out his thoughts and make some plans on who to ask and how to raise a kid.

 _Ok_ , he thought. _First thing first, I need to find a room to put her in. Change that, I need to move to one of the family apartments so she has at least some resemblance of a home. Shit, that's gonna take at least two days to do. What will I do when I have to be on the bridge? Wait Seph can care for her then. Um, that means I have to put Seph somewhere nearby. Where would that be?_ Kirk internally swears. _This is harder than I thought. How do normal parents do this and survive?!_

The doors behind him hiss open, and he hears a "Look we found Daddy!"

Slowly Kirk turns around to see Hadassah bouncing toward him with a big grin on her face. Her excitement to see him was infectious and made Kirk smile back. Glancing behind her he saw Uhura trying to hide a smile of her own.

"Daddy's where the Com- the Comp," she paused looking at Uhura. "What was it called again Mommy?"

"Mommy?" Kirk chokes out.

"Yep," Hadassah says with a grin, "I made her my Mommy, cause she acts like Mommy did and she pretty and I want her to be my Mommy. So there!" The last part of her explanation was said so forcibly that neither one wanted to tell her that Uhura couldn't be her Mommy. That the law made it so that Uhura had to adopt her before she could be her mother and that required her to marry Kirk and have his permission to adopt her. This would mean loads of paperwork from a whole ton of people including Starfleet, as they were both Starfleet officer.

Uhura looked at Kirk apologetically, "We started talking on our way and she just decided to call me mommy at some point in time. I tried to tell her I can't be her mother, but she wouldn't listen to me. I'm sorry for the trouble."

"It's not trouble," Hadassah interjected before Kirk could say anything, "I want you to be my Mommy and that's that. Daddy can't change it and even if he did I'd throw a fit. And anyways, Aunt Seph says I can throw fits better then Daddy can." She smugly finished.

"I guess its ok," Kirk said lamely.

Hadassah squealed happily. "I have a new Mommy now!" She then promptly spun around and gave Uhura a hug and said, "I love you Mommy."

Uhura looked at Kirk helplessly as she had never worked with children this young and didn't know what to do in this sort of situation. Kirk just shrugged at her to let her know that he didn't have any clue as to what to do in this situation either.

Finally Hadassah pulled back and gave Uhura her most charming smile. "Does this mean you'll live with us now? Cause both Mommy's and Daddy's live together, right?"

Both Uhura and Kirk choked on that. How do you tell a kid that such a thing is against Starfleet regulations? Unless they were married, which would be more hassles and headaches then it would be worth, a captain and one of his subordinates couldn't live together.

 _You know,_ Uhura mused to herself. _With this being Kirk's kid I really shouldn't be surprised by her very Kirk-ish ideas and plans._

"No sweetie," Kirk said kneeling in front of her so he could look her in the eye. "Uhura can't live with us. But what if Aunt Seph stayed with us instead?"

"But I want Mommy to live with us." Hadassah pouted stamping one of her feet.

Kirk sighed of course she'd get his stubbornness. "Hadassah, Mommy can't live with us. But she'll be just down the hall, ok?"

"And I can visit her whenever I want?"

"As long as I'm not on duty," Uhura piped in. "And if I am," she continued looking at Kirk, "I'm sure your daddy would be ok with you coming up to the bridge for a bit, as long as you don't get in our way of work and do what we say."

"Really?!" Hadassah asked brightening significantly.

Kirk quickly caught on to Uhura's plan. "Sure, but remember to do what we say when you're on the bridge."

"Awesome," Hadassah exclaimed, "but please, call me Dasa. Hadassah is such a _long_ name."


	4. It's Painful Raising Kids

**A/N: I know you're so impatiant for this chapter, even though it's not even been a full week. I hope you enjoy the continuation of this story. Thank you all who've faved and followed this story.**

 **PLEASE REVIEW! I _LIKE_ hearing what you have to say as it actually gives me ideas to fill the story in with. So PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, GIVE ME FOOD FOR THIS STORY!**

 **Thank you and have a good day.-Seph**

Chapter 4: It's Painful Raising Kids

On their way back to the bridge Kirk remembers that he didn't get what Dasa was trying to say, back when she had found him. Glancing down at her he smiled. She looked so happy swinging her arms as she was holding both his and Uhura's hands causing their arms to swing too.

"Dasa, what was it you were trying to say before?"

"When," she asked innocently glancing up at him.

"Back after you had found me. You started saying that I was where something… and then we got on the topic of Uhura being your new mommy. Do you remember now?"

"Oh, that," she said nodding her head knowingly. "Mommy had asked the comp-something where you were, and it was right!"

"I asked the computer," Uhura explained to Kirk.

"Right, that." Dasa said with a nod. "The Comper."

"Computer," Uhura says again.

"Compuper."

This continued for a while more with Dasa's attempts at saying 'Computer' getting weirder and weirder. When they reached the turbolift, Kirk, who was not participating in the attempts, finally told Dasa with a shake of his head chuckling softly, "Call it whatever you want."

"Ok, I will call it Compy." Dasa said with a definitive nod of her head.

Kirk found Seph to be indispensable while moving to one of the family apartments just down the hall from his previous quarters. While he and Hadassah were on the bridge, he was actually working while Hadassah was hiding from helping move, Seph spent an unknown amount of time packing his stuff, and he had a lot of random stuff he picked up from going random places and things he picked up from previous missions, and then when his day was done he and some of his senior officers would move the boxes to his new apartment, where Seph would then spend the next day unpacking it. Seph set it up this way so that everything would be organized, orderly, systematic, and they wouldn't have boxes piled up all over the apartment. As Kirk was super thankful that Seph had spent more than two weeks moving and organizing his stuff and then Hadassah's stuff when they had returned to earth after their last mission, he, with Starfleet's permission, gave his previous quarters to Seph.

The family apartment Kirk picked had a main area with a small dining area off of it that also had a door to the kitchen area in one of the walls. The kitchen was a fairly good size but still not big enough to fit a center island or even a small table in the middle. There were three rooms, a bathroom setting between two of them, and a master bedroom and bathroom in the back part of the apartment. It wasn't a huge apartment but it also wasn't a small place either, though, for just the two of them it was fairly big.

Seph had set it up like this; in the main area on the wall with the door to the hall had a holographic television set, around it were chairs and two sofas; the dining room had a table that could fit six comfortably, but could fit eight to ten with a tight squeeze; all Seph had done in the kitchen was organize it so she could find what she wanted when she went to make dinner for their "family", as she was the only one who knew how to cook anything, she did, however, pick creams and golds for the main rooms and kitchen; the first room that is on the right, once you leave the living room, was Hadassah's room this meant that she got to pick how it was decorated, what color everything was, and how it was set up, needless to say, and much to Kirk's distress, Hadassah chose to have her room in hot pink and neon purple; next on the right was the bathroom, Seph made it soft creamy-golds with deeper reds as its colors; the last room on the right was the guest room, as Seph made the case that Kirk's brother or mother may decide to visit and having them in the apartment will make it feel more like home to everyone, Seph set the room in varying shades of golds and browns; across the hall from the guest room was another room that became Kirk's office, as he had originally had it set up in one small corner of his room, in his office he had an actual filing cabinet that he has all his mission reports, various people he needs to know and/or semi keep in contact with, and other such files he needs as the captain of a fairly large ship. Last but not least, at the end of the hall was the master bedroom and bath; this room Seph let Kirk set up how he wanted, what he decided on was rich blues, reds, and golds in intricate designs around the walls and furniture, with the furniture not being metal like he had before, but rich golden toned woods. This theme of his carried over to the bathroom with the walls being red and blue, but the cabinets being golden toned and the counter tops being a darker tone. Over all it took Seph close to three weeks to get all the rooms set up nicely as both Dasa and Kirk would come in at the end of the day and move something to some random place, Seph would have them both move it back to where it had been before they had moved it. Kirk had found that even the excuse that he had captain stuff to do would not get him out of helping.

The way that Dasa's "family" was set up is like this; Jim's her dad, as he really is; Seph is her aunt, as again she really is; Uhura is her mom, because "she's pretty"; McCoy is 'Uncle Bones' cause "he's funny"; Sulu, Chekov, Scotty, and Spock, also became her uncles sometime during the past three weeks.

Dasa somehow got Kirk to agree to let her sit in the Captain's chair whenever he wasn't just to spite Spock and keep him from telling her to stop whenever he saw her in the chair.

At the moment Kirk is pacing the bridge thereby letting Dasa sit in his chair, for the moment. Spock is setting at his console working on something both Dasa and Kirk agreed was another "random project", Uhura was sitting in front of the Captain's chair playing a game of tic-tac-toe with Dasa as she hung out of the chair, and everyone else was doing their own jobs and being boring grown-ups.

The reason Kirk was pacing had to do with the call he just finished with Starfleet. According to them, Dasa needed to start school soon, as she already is five and a half years old.

"So," Kirk began, "Dasa basically needs to learn; reading, writing, math, science, history," he paused looking at McCoy who was also on the bridge as he normally like to be, "Am I missing something?"

McCoy shook his head frowning, "I don't think so."

"Ok, so who's gonna teach what?" Kirk asked.

"What can Seph teach," Uhura asked, "Because if she can't teach something then we need to find someone who can. So I ask, what can she teach?"

"Not math," Kirk said snickering.

"What?" several people asked.

Kirk decided to clarify. "Seph can only do addition, subtraction, basic multiplication and division, and fractions. The only reason Seph can do fractions is because she cooks, and that is all about fractions."

"Wait, really," McCoy jumps in, "Seph can only do basic math? How did she graduate High School?"

"Umm, Seph graduated high school because she was homeschooled." Kirk said.

"Jim," McCoy said as if explaining to a child, "you are aware that only the more 'extreme' religious groups homeschool their kids, groups like the Mormons, Jews, the likes."

"Um, Bones," Kirk asked, "you are aware that Seph is Jewish, right?"

"Seph's what?!"

"Jewish."

"What?"

"Bones, why can't you seem to get that she's Jewish?"

"Because Jews are weird and not normal and Seph can't be Jewish."

Spock steps in with a very-small-hardly-noticeable-slightly-there frown, "Excuse me Doctor, but I fail to see how her religious affiliations require such a reaction."

"Because Jews are weird and not normal and Seph can't be Jewish." McCoy states again.

"Bones, please," Kirk said with a pained voice, "can you just stop with the disbelief? Please?"

"Aunt Seph speaks Hebrew fluently," Dasa cuts in, "So why's it so hard to think she's Jewish, cause she is. So there."

"Dasa is right," Kirk continues, "Seph's first language isn't standard, it's Hebrew."

"Was she raised in Israel?" Uhura wanted to know.

"No," Kirk said shaking his head, "Thank G-"he glanced at Dasa, "-oodness," he finished, "Seph didn't have to deal with that."

"I do not understand," Spock said.

"In what was once known as the Middle East antisemitism is still known and those that follow the very old way make it their lives work to kill as many Jews as they can. In the last three hundred years, this includes WWII, The Eugenics War, and WWIII; over a billion Jews were massacred by people that hated them. This count doesn't include those that aided them, but if it did the count would be almost a trillion people dead from all races and religions. However, even with all these deaths the Jews are still not allowed on the Protected Races of Earth list."

"The What?" McCoy wanted to know.

"The Protected Races of Earth list," Uhura said, "It's a list of all the racial groups on earth that with the low population numbers they have will die out in a few hundred years, so to allow them to grow to a safe number they are registered and protected by the governments on earth."

"Ok," McCoy said still not understanding, "Why aren't the Jews on that list if they've been massacred so much?"

"I can explain that one." Kirk said raising his hand excitedly, "It's because they have weird genes." As Uhura went to interrupt him he continued, "No, no, no, let me explain. Chayah actually studied genetics in collage. Her thesis for entering the master's program was on the difference between the genetics of different races of humans, and the Jews were on her list. Chayah found that the Jewish genes are the only ones with some unusual mutations. These mutations allow them a much higher fertility rate then other humans, a near Vulcan level of intelligence, a lifespan of over a hundred-fifty, and many other stuff I didn't pay attention to as they weren't as cool as that stuff I just listed. Anyways, from what Chayah found, the less Jews there are the greater their fertility is, and they have more years they can have kids in then normal people. And that's why Jews are never put on that list for protection. They're too awesome for it!"

"Seriously Jim," Seph said having walked in just in time to hear his explanation as to why the Jews weren't on the list.

"Oh, hi Seph," Kirk said embarrassed that she had caught his very pathetic attempt at explaining what really had more to do with politics than anything else, with genetics in an attempt at deflecting the issue in a humorous way.

"I just came up here to see if Dasa wanted to help me make dinner tonight."

"Really?!" Dasa squealed with delight, "I get to help make dinner?!"

"Do you want to?" Seph asked her, "It's really hard, and you have to make a lot of things at the same time."

Dasa bounced out of the Captain's chair ran over to Seph and gave her a big hug as she yelled, "Yes, yes, yes."

Kirk laughed, "You look as happy as uncle Bones with his Hypos."

"Hypos?" Dasa asked confused before her face lit up with understanding, "Is that like a… hey Mommy what's that scientists word for teeny-tiny?"

"Macro, Micro, some others I don't know," Uhura replied waving her hand in a vague manner.

"That's it, micro," Dasa said as she tried to snap her finger like she's seen her dad do, "So a Hypo's a micro hippo, right?"

"Let me teach you how to snap your fingers before you try that, baby." Kirk said laughing.

"But Daddy," Dasa whined "I know how to snap my fingers. I just don't have grown-up hands, so that's why it doesn't make any sound. But anyway, can I have a pet Hypo, Daddy?"

"Look, darlin'," McCoy starts getting down to her level to explain something he just knew Kirk would mess up even more, "Hypo is short for Hypodermic." At Dasa's blank look he tried a different way. "You remember when you first got here how I had to give you some shots, right?" At her nod he continued, "That's a Hypo, not a tiny hippo, got it?"

Dasa pouted when he finished, "But I wanted a tiny hippo."

"Sorry baby," Kirk said still laughing, "I don't think such a thing exists."

"But," Dasa whined.

"No buts," Kirk said trying to be stern. "Now back to what we were discussing before we somehow got on to the topic of tiny hippos. Who will we get to teach Dasa for school?"

"I don't want to go to school. It's boring!"

"Baby, you need to go to school," Kirk stated to try to reason with her.

"I don't wanna, and you can't make me!"

"Dasa, you need to go to school, and that's final."

"No! I won't go to school!"

"Hadassah Elizabeth Kirk, you will go to school and you can't change that." Kirk said losing his patience.

"I won't, I won't go! You can't make me! I hate you!" Dasa yelled stomping her foot before running off the bridge in tears.

Uhura came up beside Kirk and laid a hand on his arm, noting the helpless look on his face, "Let me talk to her. I may be able to get her to change her mind." Without looking at his face she left the bridge too, leaving Kirk to feel even more helpless.

* * *

Dasa glanced up to her bedroom door as it hissed open. When she saw Uhura standing there she turned back around so that her back was to the door.

"I don't wanna go to school," she cried with a pout, "Why does Daddy hate me so much to send me somewhere that boring?"

"Oh baby," Uhura said as she sat down by Dasa, "It's not that daddy hates you, it's just that Starfleet said that if you don't have people teaching you here, that you will have to go back to earth and you won't be allowed to be on the Enterprise with us until you reach High School. And that won't be for another ten or so years."

"They said what?!" Dasa demanded aghast, "If that's how it is then I will go to school and I'll do so good that they'll let me stay forever! I don't want to leave you Mommy, or Daddy, or Uncle Bones, or Uncle Scotty, or Uncle Spock, or Uncle Sulu, or Uncle Chekov, or the Enterprise, or everyone else I know here. Please Mommy, I'll be good." She begged.

"Oh sweetie," Uhura said giving her a hug, "I know you'll be good. But we need to set up a school schedule for you to send to Starfleet so they know what you'll be learning, and if they approve it you'll be staying with us. Sound good to you?"

"Yes Mommy,"

"Ok, first off, I'll be teaching you how to read and write in standard and some other language you'll pick when you're older. Uncle Spock will teach you science and math; while Aunt Seph teaches you home-ec, which is how to cook and stuff, and history; and Daddy will teach you whatever he thinks you'll also need. Sound good to you?"

"Yep," Dasa said with a grin, "When will I start?"

"Once Starfleet agrees."

 **A/N: Hope you liked the tiny hippo=Hypo joke I threw in there. Next chapter- Dasa starts school!**

 **Have a great day, and PLEASE REMEMBER TO REVIEW! Thank you.-Seph**


	5. Troubles With School

**A/N: Sorry for taking so long to get the next chapter up, I just was stuck on how I wanted to take the story. I know how I want it to end, I just don't know how I'm going to get there. Which is why I want y'all to give me ideas on how you want me to progress. Mission ideas, conversations, little scenes for them to reference later, things like that, or even general opinions on the story. Which is the point of the reviewing option at the bottom of the chapter.**

 **Carinola, here's the next chapter! And I'm glad you like this so much you can't wait for the next chapter.**

 **And wow, longest chapter yet!**

Chapter 5: Troubles With School

"I hate school," Dasa said some days later, "It's stupid and boring."

Kirk glanced at her from where he sat. They were sitting at the dinner table working on various things. He was writing a report on a planet they'd just surveyed, Dasa was supposed to be doing homework, Seph was hand sewing on of Dasa's dresses she'd torn while playing, and Uhura was translating some text they'd found on the planet.

"Why do you think school's stupid," He asked Dasa, "I'll give you that it can be boring sometimes, but what makes you think its stupid?"

"Because, I learned how to add last week and now I want to move on to take-a-way's. I know how to add two plus two is four, see it's easy. Now can I move on to something else? I'm dying of boredom!"

Seph glanced up from her work and asked, "Did you do your other work too?"

"Yes, Aunt Seph, I did. Wanna see it?"

"Yes, Dear, I do. Please pass it over."

Dasa passed her other homework over to Seph and then just sat there waiting for her to grade it.

"Dasa, finish your math," she said not even looking at her.

"But math's boring!"

Uhura jumped in, "Do you remember what I told you a few weeks ago?"

"Of course I do Mommy," Dasa said rolling her eyes.

"Don't roll your eyes at me young lady," Uhura said with a hard look at her. Dasa looked at her lap with a guilty look, which told Uhura that she at least would listen for a bit. "If you remember our conversation then you remember why you have to do math, even if you hate it."

Dasa just sighed and gave her dad a forlorn look. "You don't have to do math, do you?"

Kirk glanced up from the report again. "Actually I do, and lots of it."

"Why?"

"Well first I have to go over the requisition orders and ensure that everything's added properly and that the cost for it is correct so Starfleet just has to put it through; I have to be aware of what's happening in every department, and you wouldn't believe how many of them have to use very complicated math; and I also have to calculate the odds of survival in every situation, which, by the way, is math you'll learn sometime in high school. Does that give you an idea of how much math I have to do in a given day?"

Dasa's wide eyed nod told him she had at least a general idea of how much he had to do even if it was just with math and not everything else. "That's a lot of math, Daddy."

"Yes it is, and Kirk's never give up. So are you gonna do your math homework?"

"Yep."

"Dasa," Seph asked.

"Yes Aunt Seph?"

"Why did you spell 'who' H-O-O?"

"That's how you spell it right? H says 'huh' and O-O says 'oo' so H-O-O spells 'who'."

"Sweetheart," Uhura said while she gently massaged her temples, "who is spelled W-H-O not H-O-O, weren't you listening when I told you this, this morning?"

"Uhh," Dasa said glancing everywhere but at the adults watching her, "Maybe? But I forgot."

"Dasa, you're my daughter, which means you're smart. I know you can do better, you just have to try."

"Oh yeah?" she shot back at him, "What grade did you get at school?"

"98% and above in all my classes. I've never gotten something below a 98%"

"That's…" she drifted off before her eyes snapped, "Then what did Mommy get?"

"Which one, me or your original mom?" Uhura asked.

"My first one," she said as if it was obvious.

"If I recall correctly," Kirk said looking at Seph, "Everyone in your family gets 95% and better on everything, even the kids with learning disabilities."

"Well, that actually depends on the subject," Seph said with an apologetic look to him, "I get somewhere around 85% and better in math, but 99% or higher in art, economics, and other such creative type classes. Chayah got 99% and better in math and other science classes, which is why she went on to get a degree in Biology with her concentration in Genetics, but she always got 79-98% in the creative type classes. Everyone else in my family has their strengths and weaknesses, but we work together and help teach those who are struggling in a topic if we are exceling. It's just how we are."

"But you're still getting above average in your classes," Uhura said shaking her head in disbelief.

"Well can't really help it with how smart we are."

"And how overachieving and perfectionists you all are."

"You know, Jim, it would be easier to say y'all in that sentence."

"But Seph, I'm not from the south, at all."

"Seph are you from the south?" Uhura really wanted to know the answer to that.

"I was raised in Tennessee for most of my life. When I was fifteen we moved out to Iowa which is where Chayah and Jim had met several years before. That was when Dasa was three-ish. So Jim and Chayah had already been apart for a few years. And you know roughly the rest of the story."

"Why didn't your parents help raise Dasa?"

"Because they moved again, off world this time, less than six months after we moved close to Chayah, and anyways, Chayah wanted Jim to be a part of Dasa's life."

"Wait," Kirk cut in, "They moved off world? Where too?"

"New Vulcan, or somewhere around there. You know they like helping people rebuild stuff after disasters. All my other siblings and their family's went with them, but I stayed and helped with Dasa."

"Bet your mom loves it there."

"Yes she does and she says that I'll love it too."

"Hmm," Kirk said thinking, then grins at Seph, "I should have Spock show you his room."

"Why," Seph asked while Uhura groaned.

"Because he has it set to Vulcan temperature."

"Don't forget the Vulcan gravity too," Uhura chimed in.

"Yeah, well Spock likes his room to be over one-hundred degrees."

"Really?" Seph perked up at that, much to Uhura's amazement.

"Ye-up," Kirk said his grin getting bigger.

"Does that mean I can change the temperature in my room?"

"You'll have to ask Spock how to do that, I never figured out how."

Seph glanced at Uhura and gave her a questioning look.

"Don't look at me; I don't know how to change it either. I also don't know why you'd want to. I like this temperature."

"Aunt Seph like it boiling hot," Dasa said dramatically.

"I do not," Seph said with an injured look, "I just like it somewhere between one-hundred and one-twenty degrees."

"Don't forget the 90% humidity too," Kirk said with a smirk.

"It's not 90%, just 80-85% humidity."

"Close enough."

"Ok," Seph said with a tired glance at Kirk, "Can we close this conversation so I can finish grading Dasa's homework and go to bed?"

"Here," Uhura said reaching for some of the worksheets Dasa did for homework, "Let me help you. This way you'll get done faster."

"Thanks Ny," Seph said with a smile.

"No prob."

"Ny?" Kirk asked, "Is that your first name?"

"No," Seph said still working on grading Dasa's Spelling worksheet, "It's just a nickname I gave her."

Kirk noticed a lot of red showing up on the spelling paper. Frowning he asked, "Are you sure that paper isn't too hard for her?"

"Jim, Chayah and I homeschooled her for almost a year. Trust me she can do this worksheet."

"Ok, that's just a lot of red there."

"She didn't even try, that's why there's a lot of red."

Kirk just nodded and glanced at Dasa before returning to his report. When he finished his report he glanced around at the three ladies that had become such a large part of his personal life, he noticed that Dasa was doodling on her math worksheet.

"Done with that Baby," he asked motioning to her math paper.

"Yeah," Dasa said still focused on her doddle.

"Want me to grade it for you?"

"Can I finish my drawing?"

"Well, considering that your bedtime is in a bit I think its best if I grade it now before you have to go to bed."

Dasa just sighed before handing her paper to her dad. She then asked, "Can Mommy put me to bed?"

"Sure, if she wants to."

"Please Mommy," she asked turning to Uhura, "I want you to read me a bedtime story."

"Ok," Uhura said just starting the last worksheet she had grabbed off the very small stack.

Dasa jumped off her chair with a squeal. "I'll go put my jammies on."

"Don't forget to brush your teeth," both Uhura and Kirk yelled after her.

"I won't," she called back.

"So," Kirk asked to the two women across from him, "Who thinks five plus seven equals eleven just because they rhyme?"

"Wait," Uhura said as she looked at him, just to make sure he wasn't joking as he often did, "Dasa said five plus seven equals eleven just because they rhymed?"

"Yep."

"How does she get these answers?" Seph wondered out loud, "Dasa's reasoning here says that she should get dye D-Y-E, as in the thing that changes a color of something, right even though she spelled it D-I-E because it's still a word."

"Hmm," Uhura said looking at her paper she was grading, "Here she said that 'People came from trees as they both have cells'. Doesn't seem to matter that both cells look very different under a microscope."

"Ok, Mommy," Dasa said running back into the room, "I'm dressed for bed."

"Dasa," Kirk said slowly, "Why aren't you trying with your homework?"

"I already told you, Daddy. It's boring."

"Dasa, if you keep going like this you'll have to go to public school on earth."

"But I don't wanna go to school on earth," she whined, "I wanna stay here, with you."

"If you don't start doing your homework properly then you'll have to whether you want to or not."

"Fine," Dasa said with a huff, "I'll fix it tomorrow."

"Good," Kirk said with a small smile. "Uhura," he said turning to her, "Why don't you give me that to finish and put Dasa to bed?"

Uhura smiled when she saw Dasa's face light up with excitement. "I think that'll work. But," she said looking at Dasa, "you'll have to finish fixing your homework before breakfast."

"How will you know if it's finished before breakfast?"

"Because, I'm coming over for breakfast."

Dasa squealed as she jumped up and down. "You're coming over for breakfast?!"

"Yep."

"It'll be done, I promise Mommy!"

"Good. Now let's go to bed," Uhura said ushering her to her room.

After a few minutes both Kirk and Seph were done grading the worksheets. Kirk stretched and said, "I'll print off some new ones for her to do tomorrow first thing in the morning before she wakes up."

"Ok," Seph said with a yawn as she got up from her chair, "Night Jim."

"Night Seph," Kirk said with an affectionate smile.

As Seph walked to the door Kirk got up and headed to his office to file the report before he checked on Uhura and Hadassah. When he saw that Dasa was asleep he walked Uhura to the door.

"Thanks Uhura," he said as she left, "I don't know how things would be right now without your help."

"No problem Kirk," Uhura said smiling at him, "I love spending time with Dasa." _And with you,_ she said to herself. She had seen another side of Kirk after Dasa had come on board. It was a side she never thought he had. A side that was thoughtful and considerate, typically towards Dasa and Seph but it still had started to bleed into his work hours too. He also had started to watch what he said, she lightly snorted to herself as she walked to her room, and really they all had, as with Dasa spending as much time with all of them they had decided that they didn't want Dasa to know some of the "bad" words that they sometimes use until she was at least ten. It also helped that Seph didn't like it when people cussed around her so everyone had started to watch what the said around her without realizing it. Uhura snickered quietly to herself. It was really funny whenever Kirk or McCoy started to slip up and had to change the word halfway through it or Kirk sometimes made up a word when he had almost finished it, the best one probably had to be Fuctuals. Uhura had no idea whether it was a word or not but Dasa didn't realize what he had started to say, which was the point of him changing it.

Uhura glanced up as she heard a door hiss open in front of her. Much to her surprise she saw Spock quickly leave Seph's room with a light green color added to his ears. _Peculiar_ , she thought, _I'll just have to ask Seph about it tomorrow_.

* * *

What had happened between the time Seph had left Kirk's apartment and Uhura seeing Spock leave her room is this.

When Seph was almost to her quarters she had ran into Spock, literally, when she had come around a corner at the same time he was going to see if Kirk had finished a report he needed tomorrow. After she had realized that Spock had caught her, which is why she hadn't fallen to the floor like she did when she ran into people, Seph had lightly blushed and stammered an apology for running into him. He had replied that it was no trouble. Seph then had remembered what Jim had said about him having the temperature set higher in his room then the rest of the ship.

"Commander," she asked.

"Yes?"

"Jim told me that you have the temperature in your room set higher than the rest of the ship. How do you do that?"

"There is a panel on the…"

"Could you show it to me?" Seph asked cutting in with an apologetic look.

"If that would work best for you," he said with a slight tilt of his head.

"Thanks, this means a lot to me."

"The captain gave you his old quarters, correct?" Spock asked as he started in that direction.

Seph hadn't realized until he stated let go of her when he had turned to take the lead that he had still been holding her throughout their entire conversation. When he glanced back at her she quickly stammered that he was correct.

When they reached her quarters she typed her access code in so they could get into her rooms. When the doors opened, Spock glanced around her rooms noting that it really was very clean and orderly. He then proceeded to mention this fact as he had seen some other humans' rooms and very rarely were they clean let alone orderly.

Seph smiled at him as she said, "All but my work rooms are like this. My work room is a mess, as I have somewhere around ten different projects I'm working on at the moment?"

Spock just nodded slightly as he moved to the room's control panel.

"This is the control panel. It allows you to set the temperature to whatever you desire. If you wish to change the gravity you will need special permission from Starfleet."

"Ok," Seph said peeking over his shoulder, but having to stand on tiptoes to do that.

"What would you like it set at?" he asked her.

"One-hundred degrees please."

He threw her a surprised look at that, though his surprise was only shown through a raised eyebrow. He imputed the change of temperature making sure she saw how he did it before he closed the panel. He quickly turned around when he saw Seph slightly trip out of the corner of his eye. Spock was relieved when he saw that she had caught herself on the table before she could hurt herself. Her 'ow' a moment later caused him some concern.

"Did you harm yourself?"

"Neh," Seph said lightly rubbing her wrist, "I think I just bruised myself that's all."

On the same wrist she had caught herself on? Spock found that highly doubtful.

"Let me look at it," He said pulling her wrist from her hand. After examining it a moment he said, "It does not look that bad though you might want to have Doctor McCoy look at it to make sure."

"Thanks," Seph said glancing up at him as she took one of his hands, "Thank you for your help Commander, it means a lot to me."

A light green touched his ears as he answered, "It was no trouble. If you have any more questions feel free to ask me, anytime."

Seph smiled a true bright smile of hers, as she said, "I'll be sure to remember that."

For some reason Spock didn't want to leave but he knew that if he didn't leave soon his control would slip and he'd do something he'd regret. So he quickly left with a sleep well to her his mouth quirked slightly when he heard her soft good night on his way out.

He passed Uhura on his way to his room but didn't stop until he had his door shut behind him. He held up his hand and saw that it trembled slightly. He had felt her respect and admiration towards him, but more specifically her love of all things alive. He had also seen a memory of hers from her childhood when her oldest brother had given her the same promise.

 _Get a hold of yourself_ , he told himself for what felt like the millionth time since Seph had come aboard. His mind kept going back to Seph and her care, kindness, compassion, and everything that he had seen of her. The way her smile ranged from a soft affectionate smile to a bright smile that seemed to light up the room whenever she smiled. But it also felt like she lit his heart with a longing for something he didn't even know he wanted. In the short time she had been on the Enterprise she already had several people go to her rather than the Starfleet's phycologists' to help solve their problems. He couldn't fathom how she could be so open to others when she had suffered so much in the past year. How could she smile and laugh when she had lost her sister? Oh and her laugh was so beautiful it filled the room with music. _Gah,_ he shouted in his mind, _stop thinking about her. Especially how much you wanted to kiss her when she'd held your hand_. But his mind wouldn't stop thinking about Seph. She just dominated his thought process, and he didn't know why. _This is going to be a long night._

 ***Smirk* Think you can figure out whats wrong with Spock? Probably not as I didn't even know it until I wrote this section. But hey, that's how stories are written.**

 **Anyways, what do you think of Dasa's schoolwork? My siblings and I have used similar logic with ours. But Still...**

 **PLEASE REVIEW!**

 **(I feel like I've already said this a million times. But please give me some food, even if it's just for thought.)**


	6. Family

**A/N: Ok, as it seems that no one understands why I want reviews, I'll clarify.**

 **Yes I'm in my twenties, yes I'm in collage, no, I've never been on a date before, so I need ideas for dates as I'm getting fairly close to when people start dating. If you want to see this story continue, give me some ideas, as all I can draw on are things I've read in books and seen in movies, which, as I'm sure y'all know, may or may not be real.**

 **So... PLEASE REVIEW AND GIVE ME IDEAS. The ones I like best will be put up in a poll so y'all can decide on first dates. But I need date ideas first.**

 **Also, I would like Y'all who have Faved and Followed to tell me why you did that. I can't improve the story or others that come after it until I know where and how to improve my writing. And those of you who haven't done either I would like to know why. Please help me improve by reviewing.**

 **Thanks-Seph**

Chapter 6: Family

The next morning Uhura questioned Seph why Spock left her room blushing. She was trying to make it sound like a big deal, which it was, but Seph didn't realize how big of a deal it was.

"He was just helping me with the temperature control; you know teaching me how to change it and all that?" Seph said while trying to cook them some breakfast. She was frying turkey bacon, eggs, and chopped potatoes, while also making some pancakes to do with it.

"Ny, would you get the syrups out and on the table while I finish this?"

"Sure, but I still want to know what happened."

"What happened?" Kirk asked walking in before moving over to give Seph her demanded morning hug. "Morning, Seph. Dasa's still working on her homework, but she's almost done."

"To answer your question, last night Spock left Seph's room blushing."

"How do you know he was blushing?" Kirk asked as he pulled down some plates.

"His ears were green."

"They're always greenish. It's how his skin is. Probably has something to do with the copper blood." He mused.

Uhura rolled her eyes. "Not green, green, like an Orion green, Jim."

Kirk's eyes widened as he pulled out forks for them. He grinned at Uhura, "You called me Jim. I say this call's for a celebration!" He paused, "Orion green? Dang that guy really was blushing. What happened, Seph?"

"Fine," She huffed, "I literally walked into him on my way back to my room, he caught me, I asked him to help me change the temperature in my room, he did and took some time to make sure I knew how to do it myself, he said I could ask him if I need help on other stuff, and then I thanked him and he left."

"That's all?" Uhura asked skeptically, "That doesn't sound like anything that would make him blush."

Seph shrugged. "Maybe you were seeing things."

"Seph," Kirk asked, "How did you thank him?"

"Like I thank you and everyone else. Jim, what's your point?"

"Did you, perhaps, by any chance, hold his hand?"

"Yeah," Seph said with a confused look, "But I fail to see how that changes anything."

At Uhura's choked sound Seph glanced at her. "What, Ny?"

"Seph, in case you didn't know, a Vulcan's hands are very sensitive. You holding his hands is just like you French kissing him."

At the deep blush that covered Seph's face along with the mortified look, Kirk had the audacity to laugh at her. He was still laughing and Seph was still frozen with the mortified look and blush covering her face, when Dasa came in with her homework completed.

"What wrong, Aunt Seph?"

"I have to apologize," she said still mortified by her actions. "I don't even know how. Ny," Seph begged turning to her, "Help me, please."

"Aunt Seph," Dasa said really starting to worry as she'd never seen her aunt not know what to say, as she was awesome like that.

"Seph," Kirk said growing as serious as he could while still laughing, "You might want to read up on that stuff so you don't do things like that."

"Things like what?" Dasa wanted to know.

"I think your dad purposefully made it vague so you wouldn't know what happened." Uhura told her.

"That's not nice," she pouted.

"We should probably eat so we can get to the bridge for our shift, Kirk."

"Ah, ah, ah. You already used my first name once, so you have to keep using it," he said to Uhura shaking a finger at her, his smug smirk returning at full force.

"Dang you," she yelled at him her hands flying up into the air, "You are so annoying!"

"It's all part of my charm."

"Fine," Uhura relented, "I'll call you by your first name while off duty if you stop flirting with every female we pass. Deal?"

"Why would Daddy need to make that deal, Mommy? And why aren't you using his name anyways. You're the one that told me we're supposed to use other people's names and not their ranks when we're friends with them. That's why Daddy uses everybody names not their ranks, right?"

"Well…" Kirk hedged, "I don't actually know Uhura's first name."

"What?!" Dasa exclaimed, "Why not?!"

"Because she never told me," He said defensively.

"Mommy," Dasa said turning to her, "You have to tell Daddy your name, cause we're family and that what family does." The hurt look that crossed Dasa's face made Uhura feel really guilty and her next words felt like daggers in her heart. "We are a family right?" Dasa asked her bottom lip trembling.

 _Dang those puppy eyes_ , Uhura thought unable to resist them. All she was able to say to Dasa was, "Of course we're a family. Jim," she said turning to him, "My first name is Nyota, but you can call me Ny when we're off duty like Seph does."

Kirk's grin from finally getting her first name disappeared the moment Dasa spoke.

"Good," her smug smirk so similar to Kirk's it made both of them realize that she'd played them just to get her way. "Now that that's been settled, let's eat. I'm starving."

* * *

To say that both Kirk and Uhura were in a bad mood all day wouldn't do it justice. It was more like a mix of them being miffed, annoyed, ticked, and terrified that someone so young could be do something like that.

McCoy finally had enough with their moody behavior, "Ok, Jim. What happened? Both you and Uhura have been in a bad mood all day, and it's almost dinner now!"

"I learned something I never want to learn again."

"What?!" He demanded, completely exasperated by all of it.

"My daughter played me just to get her way!"

"How did that little darlin' play you?"

"She somehow finagled a promise to never date anyone but her 'Mommy'" he air quoted mommy, "from me, and got a promise from Uhura and me to use each other's first name when off duty just from that sad puppy-eyes she seems to have perfected! Do you know how bad it is that I, a Starfleet Captain, got tricked, by a little girl?!" he was shouting by the end of his rant. Everyone watched their captain with wide eyes not really sure how to help him with this new problem.

"But that's not the worst," Uhura grumbled, "She seems to think she can get Starfleet to let us get married and still serve on the same ship, even though that's against normal procedure."

Kirk slumped in his chair and heaved a sigh that sounded very defeeted.

"Getting a message from Starfleet, Captain," Uhura said sounding tired.

"Patch them through," he told her rubbing his eyes.

"Something wrong Captain?" The voice came over the comms.

"Have you ever raised a kid, Admiral?"

"Three actually," the slight smirk on his face went unnoticed by the man in the Captain's Chair though not the other command crew. "Why do you ask?"

"Because," Kirk said finally looking at the man on the screen, "If you had raised kids you will actually know my pain."

The admiral just laughed at that. "Oh, I know how you're feeling. But based off of the report I just finished what I planned when I let her be on the Enterprise with you is actually happening."

"What," Kirk asked straitening in his chair.

"You've matured Kirk. Not as far as I'd like but it's only been about a month, so, there's still time."

"What do you mean 'you've matured'?"

"You don't rush into danger like you use to, you spend more time with your crew, and you pay more attention to what your crew wants and needs. Need I continue?"

Kirk just shook his head not really sure what to say to that.

"Well, that and the girl's aunt was very convincing in her arguments on why she should be with you. That woman's very logical. Almost Vulcan I'd say."

"Sounds like Seph, but Admiral, the logical debates are a cultural and religious thing not really a personal thing."

The moment the doors hissed Kirk could guess who had just come to the bridge even before the greeting.

"Daddy," Dasa said bouncing over to him before climbing into his lap. "Who's that guy?" she asked pointing to the Admiral on the screen.

"That is the head of Starfleet, Admiral Johnson."

"Oh, hello."

"Hello child. Tell me," he said smiling at her, "How are you enjoying being on the Enterprise?"

"It's good, but Mommy and Daddy seem to think you wouldn't let them be together."

"Mommy?" He asked her, "I thought that your mommy died which is why you're living with your dad."

"Oh, my first mommy did, but my new mommy's still alive and here."

"Ok, so who's your new mommy?"

"Daddy calls her Uhura, but I call her Mommy. She's sitting right there," Dasa said pointing to Uhura.

"And why do you want her to be your mother?"

"Cause she's pretty, and she's smart, and she likes me and Daddy, and I want her to be my Mommy, and if she can be my mommy I'll be really, _really_ good."

Admiral Johnson just laughed. "I guess she make a really good mom for you then?"

"Yep," Dasa said nodding her head, very proud that she got the admiral to understand her reasoning. "She's the best Mommy that isn't a real mommy ever."

"Well Lieutenant," the admiral asked looking at Uhura, "How do you feel taking the role of her mother without being her mother?"

"Well sir," Uhura said giving Dasa a smile, "She's an awesome kid, but still a Kirk, so she's a lot like a younger version of the Captain. Still she's a good kid, when she's not manipulating everyone around her." The last part was said with a stern look, and Dasa looked at her lap as if guilty, but the Admiral saw a small smirk on her face.

The admiral just hummed in response. "Sounds like a Kirk," he said with a smirk, "Though knowing the Kirk's, I think it's safe to say that it's now genetic."

"Wha-?" The question came from both Kirks.

"You did know that your father served under me for a while, right captain?"

"He did?" Dasa questioned looking at her father, "Grandpa served with the Admiral? Daddy why didn't you tell me grandpa was famous? Does that mean we're famous?" she asked with a bright and hopeful smile.

"I hate to disappoint you, baby, but no, we're not that famous."

"Say's you," muttered McCoy.

"What's that supposed to mean, Bones?"

McCoy rolled his eyes before responding. "Come on, Jim. Don't tell me you forgot."

"Forgot what?" Dasa asked.

"Kiddo, your dad is a well-known heartbreaker in Starfleet."

A snicker from the bridge's door startled them.

"Bones," Seph said from her position at the door, "Jim was a well-known heartbreaker even in high school. His mom told me that he'd break some girl's heart just by walking past them, and according to her his dad was the same."

McCoy snorted at that. "That's cause they find him too sexy not to swoon, for some reason."

"Aww, Bones," Kirk said with a teasing smirk, "You're just too old for them."

"Daddy," Dasa said turning to him.

"Yes, baby?" He asked looking down at her.

"What does sexy mean?"

"It means really good looking."

McCoy snorted at that.

"Does that mean I'm sexy too?" Dasa asked with an innocent look at him.

Kirk's wary look caused the admiral to be forced to fight a grin that was attempting to surface.

"No, Dasa," Kirk said still warily watching her, "You're not sexy you're cute."

"What's the difference?"

"Sexy is used for grown-ups, cute is used for kids. Though," his gaze went thoughtful, "that might change with you having my genes."

"Ew, Daddy," Dasa's discussed cry startled everyone, "I don't want your pants, they're too big for me and they're yours. Won't you need them first?"

The sound of laughter filled the bridge as everyone looked at the view-screen.

* * *

Admiral Johnson could not get his laughter under control, even when he tried. It was so funny. He decided that he would have to save the recording of the call to show the other admirals as this was just too funny. Who knew that what was called "The Kirk Behavior" was genetic?

He did find it somewhat sad that neither Jim nor Hadassah knew that George Kirk wasn't the first Kirk to join Starfleet. But he'd let them figure that out. At the moment he was enjoying seeing James Kirk learn to watch what he was saying. Like _really_ watch what he was saying.

Unbeknownst to most of Starfleet, the Kirk family was always given more chances then others as it was a well-known fact to the admiralty that the Kirks were the best a making the impossible possible. However, it was also well-known that they also needed a good reason to do that. Typically it was their spouse and/or children that caused them to become such people that were invaluable to Starfleet, which was why the admiralty agreed to let Hadassah live on the Enterprise. But they didn't need to know that yet.

Admiral Johnson leaned back in his chair and smiled as he watched the interplay between Kirk and his crew and his daughter's constant questions and humorous statements. He saw what Admiral Pike had seen in Kirk, "The Kirk Potential" as he liked to call it. All that meant to Pike was that Jim Kirk would live up to the same level all other Kirks had before him. He hadn't known what Pike was referring to until he became the head of Starfleet, as that information was highly classified. The only reason Pike knew was because he had known the Kirk family for many years and had watched out for Jim most of his life.

Johnson shook his head. Who knew Pike was right, He thought to himself, the Kirks are needed by Starfleet, and Jim Kirk would be perfect for that mission. He would continue to watch Kirk from Starfleet headquarters, but Kirk couldn't know what was being planned.

His door beeped.

"Enter," he commanded.

The door hissed open letting in another man.

"I was on a mission," his brusque words had a sharp edge to them that the admiral expected.

"Well, I have another mission for you. This one takes higher priority. Will you take it?"

The man sighed. "What is it?"

"Don't worry. It deals with a classified project of yours."

" _The_ classified project?"

"Is there another one I don't know about?" He asked dryly.

"What do you need?"

Admiral Johnson just smiled.

 **Oooh. Who could it be? And what are they talking about?**

 **Please remember to give me your thoughts and ideas!**


	7. Trouble

**A/N: Sorry it took so ling to get this up. This chapter did not want to be written. And Sorry about the "update" last month. That was me fixing typos I found in previous chapters.**

 **Please REVIEW! I don't know what will happen in the next chapter except for the explanation as to why Bones thinks Jews are weird... Though, you kinda got a sneak peek at that anyways in this chapter.**

 **But seriously... please give me an idea for the next chapter or I'll start taking STOS episodes and giving them a slight twist too.** **Thank you** TigerRomandy **for your review and as you can tell I took it and gave it a twist, so sorry Kirk still won't get a kiss. Ok, I'm not really sorry about that. Lol.**

 **Hope you enjoy this chapter. And please let me know what you think!**

 **Lots of love,**

 **-Seph**

* * *

Chapter 7: Trouble

As the months passed Dasa continued to improve academically with the threat of having to stay on Earth if she failed the end of year test. Dasa was feeling incredibly stressed from trying to catch up with her peers in school; getting Mommy and Daddy to go on a date, and hopefully get married soon so she'd have a real mommy to go with her now real daddy; and as Aunt Seph looked _so lonely_ , finding someone good for her to date and marry so she would stop being lonely.

Little did Dasa know that she had passed her peers, and moved from first grade into second grade, in less than four months. Kirk bore a smug smirk, and was not adverse to telling everyone on board "I told you she was smart", and "That's my baby girl" whenever Dasa wasn't around.

The day started out like every day but as everyone looked back, it ended like most days, especially with two Kirks aboard.

It was still fairly early when Seph woke up, as usual, as Seph tended to wake up at five in the morning. The night before she had given the midterm test to Dasa and now she was going to grade it. As it was so early and very few were up and about, Seph decided to go to the crew's eating area. Even after all these months she still couldn't remember the name of that place as she hardly went there, but today it was just easier and less disturbing to everyone's sleep.

When she entered se didn't see anyone around so Seph just put the stack of tests on a table near the food synthesizer and got herself a cup of hot coco. Sitting down Seph started working on the tests. Thankfully, it was a standard test so she had the answer key to go with it and didn't have to know everything off the top of her head. Seph had barely finished the first page of the first test when someone spoke to her.

"I presume this seat is not taken."

"Not at all," she responded not really paying any attention to who it was or even looking at who it was.

"Would you prefer some help?"

Seph just hummed in response still not paying any attention.

"Seph?"

The question brought her out of her work. "Hmm, What?" She asked looking up. Seph quickly blushed as she finally registered just who was sitting across from her, and to whom she was just incredibly rude to. It was someone she had been avoiding for several months, well at least as best she could seeing as she visited the bridge with Dasa every other day or so.

"Oh, Commander," Seph said quickly looking away as her blush deepened, "I didn't see you there."

Spock quirked an eyebrow, curious at her statement. "I fail to understand how you did not "see me" as you answered a question I asked. Logically that means that you registered that I was here."

"Well," Seph began still not looking at him but rather fidgeting with the papers in front of her. "Sometimes I'm so caught up in whatever I'm doing that I don't register anything around me, that includes people and conversations. One of my brothers once told me that they'd had a whole conversation with me that I still have no memory of."

"If I may make a personal inquiry, how many siblings do you have?"

"I have seven brothers and had five sisters, now I only have four. Though," Seph said with a smile, "I do have five nieces and nine nephews. Yet," Seph laughed softly, "Only five of my siblings have kids."

Spock's could not conceal his shock at learning she had eleven siblings. That amount was unheard of among Vulcans, and he had yet to encounter another race that could have that number of children.

When he finally regained his voice he asked, "Is not eleven children unheard of among humans?"

"Well," Seph hedged still not looking at Spock, "It's rare but not unheard of. In the area I was raised in we had a neighbor that had eight kids and we knew another family that had ten kids. And, Commander, we have twelve kids in my family."

Spock observed her for a few minutes as she tried to continue grading the tests. "Why will you not look at me while we are conversing? And I thought I told you that it was alright to call me Spock rather than commander."

"Umm," Seph said searching for an escape, "Dasa should be up now so I'll get these back to her." With that Seph was up and out the door before Spock could say anything else.

Spock glanced at the clock, 5:30 a.m. There was no way either Kirk or Dasa were up at this time as they both tended to sleep in and complain if awoken before 8:00. _Why is she avoiding me,_ Spock asked himself confused, _did I do something wrong without knowing it? Perhaps I can find her later and get her to tell me then._

As Spock got up he noticed that Seph had left her red pen she uses for grading Dasa's homework still on the table. Spock decided that it would be most logical to give it to her himself as he was there when she forgot it, and if he so happened to ask her why she was avoiding him while he was speaking with her and she told him, well, it wasn't like he had sought her out for an illogical reason was it?

* * *

"Daddy," Dasa asked as Kirk attempted to help her pick an outfit for the day. So far she kept dismissing his ideas and picking clothes in the neon tones that _so_ did not match at all, color and style included.

"Yes, baby," Kirk asked still trying to come up with an outfit that did not have a neon green tutu in it somewhere, like Dasa wanted so bad.

"Why won't you let me wear my green tutu?"

Kirk paused before he turned to look at her. She was so serious, she just could not seem to understand that a neon green tutu just did not match her pink and purple poke-a-dot leggings, neon yellow shirt, and electric blue and lime green sandals. Oh, and she totally needed to have her hot pink feather boa too.

"You know what," Kirk said sitting on her bed and grabbing his glass of water he'd put on her nightstand when he'd come in to help her, "Just wear whatever you want today. It's not like you're listening to me anyways." The last part he'd grumbled so Dasa didn't quite catch what he said.

"What daddy?"

"Nothing, Dasa."

"Ok."

After a moment of looking over her chosen outfit for the day, just to make sure she hadn't left anything out she finally asked her dad what she'd wanted to ask him for days now.

"Daddy, when are you gonna marry Mommy?"

To Dasa's horror her Dad spewed water all over her floor and sat there choking on the water that went the other way.

"Daddy," Dasa cried, "you Ok? Daddy?"

"Jim," Uhura asked sticking her head in, "Is everything ok in here?"

Kirk just waved her off still trying to get his breath back. "Yeah," he croaked, "I'm good."

"Ok," she said giving him a skeptical look, "Just letting you know, breakfast is almost done."

"Ok," Kirk said waving her off again, "Just let me help Dasa get dressed first."

"Ok then, I'll see you when you're done."

"Daddy," Dasa said after a pause, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to almost kill you."

Kirk quirked a smile at her, "It's ok, Dasa, I just started swallowing the water the wrong way."

"But, Daddy."

"No, Dasa. Stop blaming yourself," Kirk reached for the leggings she picked for the day, "But," he paused giving her a long look, "you know Mommy and I need to date before I can marry her. I told you this before."

Dasa looked at the ground sheepishly, "I forgot."

Kirk just sighed.

"So when are you gonna ask Mommy out?"

"Dasa," Kirk said giving her a hard stare, "Drop it."

"But, Daddy," she stopped when he gave her a glare. Dasa then decided to pout cause it was so unfair. "Fine," she said not looking at her dad, "but, it you don't ask Mommy out soon someone else will."

"Dasa," Kirk said annoyance lacing his voice, as Dasa tended to bring this conversation up at least once a week. "Fine, I'll ask her out for dinner or something."

"Yippy!"

"Come on," Kirk said shaking his head, "You still need to get dressed."

"Ok."

* * *

Lunch was in a few hours and Kirk still hadn't asked Uhura out for a date; Spock still had yet to find Seph; Uhura had overheard some of Kirk and Dasa's conversation, at least the important part and was waiting for Kirk to get his buns in gear and ask her out; and Seph was noticeably absent from breakfast, she apparently stopped by before they were up and left Dasa's tests for her to go back over and correct her mistakes.

Finally Kirk had enough of the boredom and slowly got out of his chair and passed the Comm to Spock so he could go stretch his legs somewhere more interesting. Before he left he asked if anyone, who wasn't needed on the bridge for the time being, wanted to go with him.

"I'll come," Uhura said getting up from her station, "It's not like there's much to do right now."

"I'll come for a bit too," McCoy said.

"No work for you today Bones," Kirk asked teasingly while they waited for the turbolift to reach the level they wanted.

McCoy snorted at that, "It's not like we've found anything that could hurt people lately."

" _Sickbay to McCoy, Sickbay to McCoy."_

"McCoy here, go ahead Sickbay."

" _We've had a slight accident in one of the corridors and we have seven people injured."_

McCoy sighed, "I'm on my way. McCoy out." He turned to Kirk and Uhura, "Sorry kids, looks like our group trip has to be postponed. Don't break any rules."

"What were you saying 'bout people getting hurt?"

"Ya know Jim, that mouth of yours will one day get you into a lot of trouble. Behave." McCoy said over his shoulder as he headed towards sickbay.

After a few minutes of walking, Kirk glanced at Uhura.

"Think Bones is making whoever got injured lives miserable?"

"More than likely," she said smirking.

"Remember all those times we got back just for back for some mission and Bones would yell at us and give us hours of lectures while patching us back up?"

"Um, Kirk," Uhura paused, "He doesn't lecture us, just you."

"Wha-?" Kirk stared, "Bones doesn't lecture you, just me? Why?"

"Maybe it's cause you're the only one who runs into danger head on without a plan."

"I plan," Kirk said indignantly.

"Uh-huh."

"Ok," Kirk said looking everywhere but her, "I don't plan everything."

"Told ya," Uhura's smug tone made Kirk's head shoot toward her.

"You don't have to rub it in," He whined

She just laughed as they continued walking.

"Hey, Ny," Kirk started and then faltered, "Would you… Ya know…"

"No, I don't, not until you tell me.

"Well, I was thinking…"

"That's new."

"I'm being serious here."

"That's also new."

Kirk threw his hands in the air while Uhura grinned.

"Ya know, never mind."

"Come on Jim," Uhura said still grinning, "You won't know what I'll say until you finish your sentence, isn't that what you tell Dasa?"

"Well…" He sighed, "Ok, I'll finish," He took a deep breath, "Will you go out to dinner with me?"

"Like a date?"

"No, like a porcupine," Kirk said sarcastically.

"Seriously, Jim," Uhura asked with a pointed look.

"What?"

"A porcupine?"

"It's the first thing that popped into my head."

"But still, a porcupine?"

"We're getting off track here."

"Fine."

"What?"

"Yes, you idiot, I'll go out with you."

"You will?"

"You thought I'd say no?"

"Well… After the first time at that bar and after that when we were at the academy, I thought you'd never say yes."

"You… wait really?" Uhura stared at him, "You've wanted to ask me out that long? Why didn't you?"

"Uh, cause you've pretty much said no when I asked you before?"

"Jim, I was saying no to your attempts to flirt with me and every girl you laid eyes on at the same time."

"Seriously?" Kirk asked turning around so he was walking backwards, "That's why you kept saying no?"

"Yeah, is that so hard to believe?"

"Well, I guess not, not really."

"Good. Now what time should I expect you to pick me up?"

"Um…"

"You didn't plan that yet did you?"

"I didn't expect you to say yes, so no, I didn't plan that yet."

"How 'bout 5:30, my door."

"Sound good."

"Where and what are we eating?"

"Dress nice. The rest is a surprise."

"You haven't planned it yet," Uhura said with a smile.

"I think we need to get back to the bridge."

"Fine."

Uhura's laughter followed them to the turbolift.

* * *

Lunch had passed almost an hour ago before Kirk finely had enough and kicked everyone who hadn't had lunch yet off the bridge to get themselves lunch. For fun every few steps toward the turbolift they kept asking if the bridge would survive without them.

"Just get some lunch already," Kirk yelled at them.

Sulu and Chekov were the last to file off the bridge after Kirk yelled at them.

"You too, Spock," Kirk sighed, not even glancing toward him.

Spock just inclined his head before heading to the turbolift.

Much to Spock's surprise the turbolift stopped before the level he wanted, and opened to show Seph. When she saw Spock, she hesitated before stepping on.

To Seph, the decent seemed to last forever before the Turbolift lurched, throwing both Spock and Seph, before it stopped in between decks.

After an unknown amount of time, Seph, managed to crack her eyes open just a bit before a really bad headache slammed into the forefront of her awareness causing her eyes to tear from the pain. When the pain became more of a throb than stabbing pain, Seph glanced around in an attempt to understand why her head hurt so much. Looking at Spock, who was attempting to reroute power to the comms so they could let anyone know where they were, Seph was momentarily confused as to why both he and the walls were moving.

"What happened?"

Spock glanced back when Seph spoke before turning back to his work.

"I am uncertain as to why we are stopped. However I am attempting to contact someone to fix the issue. As to the pain you must be feeling, you hit your head against the railing when the Turbolift stopped."

"That would explain the moving walls," Seph said dryly. "Anything I can help with?"

"There is a panel behind you in the wall. Remove it and tell me if it is receiving any energy flow."

"So… This panel," Seph said pointing to one of the many panels on the wall.

Spock glanced back at her. "The one two to the right."

"Oh," Seph said, "That one. I must be blind not to have seen it."

After a bit of a struggle Seph got the panel off and looked into the wall. "Ok," she said, "Not to sound stupid and all, but how do you know if there's power coming through the panels?"

"Do you see the side with five lights?"

"Yeah… And?"

"Are they lit?"

"Nope."

"Then it is not receiving power, and you may return the panels cover back to its place."

"Oh goody," Seph muttered sarcastically as she put the panel cover back up. "I took you down and now I get to put you back up because you're annoying and making everyone's lives difficult by not working."

After getting the cover back in place, Seph turned and looked at Spock who was putting the cover back on his panel.

"Now what?"

"We wait."

"For how long?"

"However long is required for the Captain to realize that I have yet to return to my post."

"That's gonna take a while."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because, unless Jim needs you for something he won't know you're not there. So, we have to wait until one of us is looked for by someone, wait for them to figure out where we are, not to mention how long it's going to take them to find out what's wrong and fix it, so we might as well get comfortable as that may take several hours if not more."

"Very well," Spock said as he sat down across from Seph.

"Ok then," Seph said with a tight lipped smile. "What shall we talk about?"

"Why are you avoiding me?"

"Aw flablesticks, that had to be your first question."

"I do not understand."

"Can we talk about something else?" Seph pleaded.

"Why do you refuse to tell me?"

"Atta kol kal akhshan!"

"I do not understand."

"I said 'you are so stubborn'!" Seph ground out. "Lamah af echad achar lada'at Eevreet?!"

"Translation?"

Seph sighed as she bent forward and hit her head on the floor before mumbling something.

"I do not understand."

"You seem to be saying that a lot." Seph said partially sitting up so she could look at him.

Spock just stared at her causing Seph to sigh again.

"Fine," she said giving up. "Lamah af echad achar lada'at Eevreet means… why doesn't anyone understand Hebrew. Well it literally means, why no one else understand Hebrew. Happy?"

"What is the Hebrew word for themselves?"

"Eevreet means the Hebrew language and Eevrey is the Hebrew people."

"Alright, so back to my question, why are you avoiding me?"

"Lo, anney al bakhashah l'saper at." Seph said pouting while Spock stared at her with incomprehension. "I said I don't want to tell you."

"This is the most I have heard you speak in Hebrew since coming on board."

"It's because I hit my head and I think in Hebrew so I reverted to something I naturally speak and think in."

Spock inclined his head. "That is understandable."

"Toda."

"What?"

"Thank you."

"Are you still going to evade not telling me why you are avoiding me?"

"Ugh!" Seph said letting her head fall back to the wall. "Atta kol kal akhshan!"

"You have already stated that before."

"And I mean it! You have a lot of Chutzpah, Spock. But, fine I'll tell you. Oh, out of curiosity… are you sure you're not Jewish?"

"I do not understand."

"Ok, so the reason I've been kinda-sorta-defiantly avoiding you is because I'm embarrassed."

"For what reason do you feel embarrassed?"

"Ny told me that Vulcan hands are very sensitive and I… well… I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

Spock blinked a few times. "Is that why you have been avoiding me?"

"You make it sound like it's stupid."

"Uhura is correct in saying that Vulcans do not touch hands often."

"So you do touch hands?"

"With our mates, yes. However it is simply due to the fact that we are telepathic and touch empaths, so when our hands touch we see, hear, and feel others thoughts, memories, and emotions."

"Now I feel even worse!"

"On the contrary," Spock said. "Your emotions are well controlled, and your memories are strong but gentle. However, you love your family very much and greatly long to see them again. You are very close to them and you look up to your older siblings and parents for examples on how to behave and live well. And what does Chutzpah mean?"

"Chutzpah is Yiddish and it means 'Shameless audacity; impudence; boldness; supreme self-confidence; gall'; sometimes means stubbornness too. You get the gist."

"Why did you ask if I was Jewish?"

"Because chutzpah is a genetic Jewish thing, others have it but not as much as the Jews. It's a racial 'curse' but it really can go both ways, meaning it can be both a blessing and a curse. So, yeah."

"I see."

"So how long have we been down here?"

"I am uncertain."

"Wait, you? Uncertain of time?"

"There was a period of time where we both were unconscious. However I have been conscious for 2.95 hours and you have been conscious for 1.73 hours."

"That means we have a few more hours until dinner. Which, if they're not looking for us by then, Jim'll know we're missing, and then they'll go looking for us."

"How do you know that?"

"Because, Ny wanted my opinion on what to wear for her date tonight. So, if I'm not there when her date gets there, she'll know something happened and they'll start looking for me and by default, you."

"So we wait."

"I guess."

* * *

 **Half an hour earlier…**

"Where's Spock?" The question that came from Uhura caused the work on the bridge to stop and everyone to look around searching.

"He's missing?" Kirk asked looking up from the game he was playing with Dasa on his PADD.

"Where's Aunt Seph too?"

"Where is Seph?" Kirk asked frowning. "She was supposed to be here already to give Dasa back her homework."

"But Daddy," Dasa whined, "Homework's stupid, cause I already know it, so why make me do it again?"

"Dasa, we've talked about this."

"Fine," she huffed.

"We're still missing Spock and Seph," Uhura said.

"Ok, so when was the last time anyone saw either of them?" Kirk asked.

"Lunch time when you told Spock to go eat, and just after breakfast when Seph sat down with Dasa to work on homework." Uhura said.

"Aunt Seph wanted to correct my stuff so I went down to Uncle Scotty 'bout lunch time. He let me play with some stuff while I was there, that was fun."

"So about lunch time was when both of them were last seen," Kirk said sighing. "Well that's just great. Computer, were is Commander Spock?"

" _Commander Spock is in Turbolift two."_

"Turbolift two hasn't been responding for an hour maybe more," McCoy said with a frown.

"So… That means Spock is in a stuck Turbolift. Scotty," Kirk said hitting the intercom. "What's wrong with Turbo lift two?"

" _I dinna know Cap'tin. I'm still tryin' ta figure it out."_

"Let me know when you do, Kirk out."

"So Spock and possibly Seph are stuck in a Turbolift with an unknown problem, Scotty's still trying to find the issue, and we don't know if they're ok." McCoy summed up.

"How long do you think it gonna take to find the issue?" Kirk asked McCoy.

"Dang it, Jim, I'm a doctor not an engineer!"

"I thought you knew everything Daddy!"

"Dasa, I may know a lot of stuff, but I'm not omniscient."

"What's om-omni-ommy whatever it is?"

"It means 'all knowing', sweetheart," Uhura said.

"Oh… Ok," Dasa said sounding disappointed. "So, Daddy doesn't know everything." Her eyes shot up to Kirk before she grinned. "Doesn't mean he doesn't know more than everybody else, except Aunt Seph and Mommy, they know more 'bout being girls then Daddy."

McCoy's eyes went to the ceiling. "Someone save us," he muttered.

"What'd you say, Uncle Bones?"

"Just praying for the future, Darlin'."

"Why? It's not like its bothering us… yet."

"It's the 'yet' I'm worried about," he muttered to himself.

* * *

"What time is it?"

"You have asked that question 53 times in the last hour. As I have stated then I do not know."

"Come on Spock, I thought Vulcans had good internal clocks."

"We do. However our internal clocks are most accurate if we have a reference point from which to begin. As we do not have such a reference point since regaining conciseness, my internal clock is inaccurate."

"What if we used my watch?"

"Your watch?"

"Yeah, it died just after I got the cover off the panel when we were working to get comms up."

"What time did it stop on?"

"Umm," Seph said looking at it hard.

"Can you not read it?"

"It's analog, Spock, almost no one can read them now-a-days. Seriously, people stopped learning how to read them over two hundred years ago. I had to do a lot of reading to figure out how to read one after I bought it."

"If no one knows how to read an analog clock, where did you get your watch from?"

"An antique store. It took forever to find batteries that would work in it."

"I see. What time did it stop at?"

"It stopped at…" Just as Seph said that the lights in the turbolift went out.

"Ok," Seph said blinking hard in an attempt for her eyes to adjust to the sudden lack of light. "What just happened?"

"It appears that Engineering is attempting to find the error that caused the turbolift to stop."

"Ah, well my watch stopped somewhere before 2:30-ish. Does that help?"

"Indeed. That means it is about 6:30-ish right now."

"Ok, you have defiantly spent too much time around humans, you're starting to sound like one."

"Is that an issue?"

"Depends on how you define 'an issue'."

"I understand."

"I'm bored."

"Does this mean you will start singing again?"

"Sorry," Seph said sounding annoyed. "I sing when I'm bored, do you have an issue with that?"

"On the contrary, your voice is very melodic."

"Toda, I think," Seph sighed, "Thanks Spock."

After a moment Seph spoke up. "Do you really not mind my singing?"

"I do not."

"Oh thank you."

After another moment a song started to float through the air, a melody thousands of years old.

"Adon olam, asher malach, b'thehrem kol y'tzir nivra…"

* * *

" _Cap'tin,"_ Scotty's voice rang through the intercom. _"I know what went wrong with Turbolift two!"_

"That's great news Scotty," Kirk said grinning. "What'd you find?"

" _Well,"_ he said pausing, " _It seems like when the lassie came down about lunch time she played with some of the controls and one of the controls she messed with ran the Turbolift. So when the next person used it the Turbolift broke."_

"Great job Scotty!"

" _We still have a bit o' a problem Cap'tin."_

"Ok."

" _The Turbolift is stuck in between decks so we canna reach it 'til it moves to a deck."_

"Great," Kirk's sarcastic tone was not missed by those around him.

" _It's gonna take a wee bit more time before we can get the Commander and Seph out again."_

"So she is in there too."

" _Ay Cap'tin, she is."_

"How much longer will it be?"

" _It's kinda hard ta say Cap'tin. Half an hour, maybe more?"_

"Half an hour?! Scotty it's almost seven-fifteen!"

"Poor Seph," Uhura said pitying her. "She's probably so hungry and thirsty right now."

"They're more than likely dehydrated," McCoy agreed.

"Seph's probably not that hungry," Kirk disagreed.

"Why do you say that, Jim?"

"It's called Yom Kippur."

"Oh… Yeah… Ok," Uhura said nodding her head. "She's more than likely not hungry then."

"What?" McCoy asked.

"Twenty four hour fast," Kirk explained, "Comes around once a year."

"How do you fast for a full day?!"

"It starts at six PM one day and they sleep for a good eight or more hours before they do their thing and it ends at six PM that day. That gives them really only fourteen to sixteen hours of fasting while awake." Kirk explained.

"Jim," McCoy asked, "How do you know all this?"

"I asked Chayah, she took lots of time to explain the holidays to me, which ended with me doing the holidays with her for a year. That was actually fun."

"You enjoyed fasting," McCoy didn't ask but rather stated.

"I'll let Seph explain the holidays. She'll do a better job than me. But it'll have to wait 'til tomorrow."

"Told you Jews were weird," McCoy said, "Who else would fast once a year? See, Jews are weird."

"Seph never said they weren't," Kirk said grinning. "Anyways, first thing Seph's gonna do once out is to eat some oranges and drink some pickle juice."

"Oranges and pickle juice," McCoy said trying to see if Kirk was serious. "What?"

"Yom Kippur," Uhura said as if it explained everything.

"Yep," Kirk said still grinning. "First thing Seph does after Yom Kippur is eat some oranges to counteract the stomach acid that built up in her stomach while fasting, and drink pickle juice for the electrolytes and the fact it fixes dehydration. So, yeah… She's going after that stuff first."

"She's weird," McCoy said shaking his head.

"She's a Jew… What'd you expect?" Kirk asked. "Well, I'm gonna call it a day. Have fun!" And with that he walked off the bridge to get ready for his date.

* * *

"Ilu natan, natan lanu, natan lanu et ha-Torah, natan lanu et ha-Torah, Daye-"

The sudden lurch of the Turbolift caused Seph to cut off her singing with a yelp of surprise.

Spock stood up before assisting Seph to her feet.

"It appears that they have repaired the Turbolift."

"Still wanna know what happened to it," Seph muttered under her breath.

"What song was that?"

"The one I was just singing?"

He nodded.

"It's called Dayenu. It means 'It would have been enough' or there abouts."

"How so?"

"Well the first verse is saying 'If he had taken us out of Egypt, If he had given us the Sabbath, If he had given us the Torah,' and the chorus means 'It would have been enough. So the song basically is saying 'if God had only freed us from slavery, given us a day of rest, given us his law, any _one_ of those would have been enough, but he still continued on. So… Yeah, it's a fun song."

A moment after Seph finished her explanation the door opened to show them Scotty and a whole engineering team looking very relieved.

"Thank goodness ye are alright lassie," Scotty said sighing with relief.

"Thanks for the rescue, Scotty," Seph said smiling. "What happened anyways?"

"Well…" He sighed again, "It was Dasa. The wee lassie played with some controls in engineerin' and it took me some time ta figure out what she did. I'm real sorry lass."

"It's Ok, Scotty," Seph said with a smirk, "You know now not to let Dasa play with the controls."

"Ay, lassie, that I do."

"Good," Seph said smiling brightly. "I'm going to get some oranges and some pickle juice before I get something more solid to eat. I'm hungry. Wanna join me Spock, as you haven't eaten yet, too?"

"Perhaps we can continue our conversation."

"Khamoovan," Seph agreed.

She just grinned at Spock's raised eyebrow before saying, "Of course."

Spock just nodded his head before he and Seph headed for food. Though he never would admit it, Spock, wished it could be a date.

* * *

 **Later that night…**

"Thanks Jim," Uhura said as they walked back to their quarters. "I had fun."

They stopped in front of the apartment he shared with Dasa.

"We should do this again," Kirk said.

"Yes," Uhura agreed, "We should."

After a moment or two Uhura finally asked, "Do I get a 'good night' kiss?"

"Isn't that kinda tacky?"

"Seriously Jim, you're worried about tacky? Isn't that your life story?"

"Ok, that's just mean."

"Kinda true though," Uhura said with a smile. "I'm still waiting for my kiss."

Just before he could kiss her though, the door hissed open and a small figure ran out and hugged him.

"Daddy's home!"

"Dasa," Kirk groaned, "You're supposed to be asleep."

"But I wanted to stay up. And you didn't read me a bedtime story," she pouted before trying to hide the yawns threatening to escape.

"Ok, Baby," Kirk said scooping her up in his arms. "Time for bed."

"Night-Night Mommy," she said as she was carried inside for bed.

"G' night sweetheart," Uhura said fighting a grin from how cute they were.

 _Kirk had changed_ , Uhura mussed. Rather than the womanizer he had been, his first priority now was his daughter. Uhura had tested him, of that she'd admit. Her test was the kiss, but when Dasa had ran out he hadn't even tried to grab a quick kiss before going to put her to bed. Kirk had changed and it was a good change.

Uhura hummed all the way to her quarters quite happy with her night. _A relationship just might work with him now. It just might work._

* * *

 **A/N: And wow word count is over 5,800 in this chapter! LONGEST CHAPTER YET!** _  
_


	8. Define Terms

**A/N: Here's the next chapter as promised in _T'hy'la._ Thank you all for sticking with me through the writers block!**

 **ShyxSkater: Here's the reason Bones thinks Jews are weird.**

 **Also... here's a small crash course in Hebrew. If you either don't care or already know this feel free to skip this. Otherwise PLEASE READ THIS!**

 **Hebrew has 5 vowel combinations rather than the dozens English has. They are...**

 **"A" is pronounced "AH" like f _a_ ther**

 **"E" is pronounced "EH" like g _e_ t**

 **"I"** ** **is pronounced "EE"**** **like f _ee_ t**

 **"O"** ** **is pronounced "OH" like b _oa_ t  
****

 **"U"** ** **is pronounced "OO" like t _oo_  
****

 ** **The reason I did this is so I don't have to put the literal pronunciation for you and I can now put the transliteration in instead! YIPPY!****

 ** **Oh, and the apostrophe ( ' ) in words denotes a syllable break as well as sound difference. Example Tish B'Av is pronounced T _EE_ sh B(with the "B" by it's self)-AHv. Make sense? Yes? Good.****

 ** **Hope you have a great day and like this chapter.****

 ** **Let me know what you think- Seph****

* * *

 **Chapter 8: Define Terms…**

The next morning Kirk and Uhura headed to the bridge while Seph and Dasa worked on schoolwork.

"Aunt Seph," Dasa asked after a few minutes of working.

"Yes, Dasa?"

"Did you know Daddy almost kissed Mommy last night?"

"And how did you learn that?"

"Cause I saw it."

"Oh?"

"Yep," Dasa said sounding quite proud of her knowledge. "Daddy took Mommy out for dinner, and when they came back Daddy almost kissed Mommy. I know cause I waited up for them."

Seph sighed before responding, "Dasa, you shouldn't have stayed up waiting for them to get back. You know your bedtime's 8:00 not 10:30. So why did you stay up two and a half hours after you were supposed to be asleep?!"

"You're mad at me aren't you."

"Your bedtime's there for a reason, Dasa. Don't stay up past it, ok?"

"Yeah, ok."

"Now back to your test. Spell: Beautiful. The woman was beautiful. Beautiful."

"I hate spelling tests," Dasa muttered quietly.

* * *

 **A little while later…**

"Well, you only missed one out of eleven words," Seph told the impatient girl in front of her.

"Yes!"

"Though," Seph paused. "How you decided that Bountiful is spelled B-O-U-N-T-Y-F-U-L-L I will never understand."

"Because its _FULL_ of _BOUNTY_. See? Bountyfull!"

"Dasa when a word ends in "Y" you change the "Y" to "I" _then_ add the ending." Seph bent down to Dasa's level before continuing, "And it only has one "L" like "Beautiful" not two like you spelled it."

"What?!" Dasa demanded "It only has one "L" like "Beautiful"?!

"Yep," Seph said before straitening up. "Come on. Let's go show your dad." She held out her hand for Dasa to take.

"Yippy!" Dasa cheered as she jumped down from the chair she had been sitting on to grab her Aunt's offered hand.

On the way to the bridge Dasa kept bouncing a little ahead of Seph incredibly excited with her score before being called back to her Aunt's side, where she stayed for about a minute before bouncing ahead again. Even on the Turbolift Dasa couldn't seem to stand still. Once the doors opened Dasa was out of the Turbolift and running toward the center of the bridge.

"Daddy!" she very nearly screamed in delight as she threw herself into Kirk causing him to fall back into the Captain's Chair with an audible "Oomph."

"I take it that you passed your spelling test," he asked looking down at Dasa.

"Yep!"

"Final score?"

"She got ten out of eleven right," Seph said with a small smile coming up beside them.

"Knew you could do it," Kirk said messing Dasa's hair up. "Which one did you miss?"

"Daddy," she whined as she tried to fix her hair, but really only succeeding in making it look worse, causing almost everyone to start to snicker or laugh. "I missed "Bountiful," she said looking down glumly.

"Bounti- How did you miss bountiful?" He asked her.

"I spelled it B-O-U-N-T-Y-F-U-L-L because you spell bounty B- O-U-N-T-Y and full F-U-L-L so you put them together and you get bountyfull. See?" Dasa looked up expecting him to have followed her logic. "But aunt Seph says it's _supposed_ to be spelled B-O-U-N-T- _I_ -F-U-L without the second L."

Kirk nods, "Bountiful does have an "I" and only one "L" doesn't it?"

Dasa watched Kirk carefully before seeing that he was fighting a grin. "Daddy!" she yelled at him exasperated at his amusement while stamping a foot in annoyance.

"Seph," Kirk said changing the subject in an attempt to avoid looking at Dasa so as not to laugh at her. "Sulu has a question that requires your more… knowledgeable expertise."

"What question?" Seph asked looking at Sulu curiously.

"Well…" Sulu asked. "Yesterday Kirk said that you could explain more about the Jews than his..."

"Pathetic attempt?" Seph filled in with amusement.

"It was fairly pathetic wasn't it?" Kirk said with a grin.

"What do you want to know about the Jews? After all, we need a place to start." Seph said.

"Well," He paused hesitating before finally asking, "What make Jews so abnormal?"

Seph started laughing before saying, "A lot of things."

"Like what?"

"Well for one we have…give me a moment to count," Seph said frowning before ticking them off on her fingers. "There are the Sephardic, the Ashkenazim, the Mizrahi, Ultra-Orthodox, Orthodox, Conservative, Liberal, Messianic, Reform, Zionists, Non-Practicing, and… I'm missing some. Which ones am I missing?" Seph paused to recount what she had said before frowning, "That's only eleven. There should be about five more. What am I missing?" She shrugged, "Oh well. They're obviously not important. Anyways, that's eleven of the sixteen seventeen-ish sects of Judaism."

"How many sects?" Sulu asked surprised.

"Sixteen or seventeen or, well, somewhere around there." Seph responded.

"Don't forget about the holidays." Dasa interrupted. "If you need one good reason to be Jewish the holidays are the best ever. After all," She said giving what everyone had dubbed the "Kirk Smirk", "depending on your level of observance there are somewhere between one holiday every other month to more than one holiday a month, not counting the weekly holiday."

"Weekly holiday?" someone asked.

"Mmhum," Seph hummed in agreement while trying to fight a smile at Dasa's attitude. "The Shabbat. The weekly day of rest, no working, build up bonds in the community and family, that sort of thing." Seph paused to take a breath allowing McCoy to cut in.

"Told you Jews were weird," McCoy's smug tone caused Seph to laugh.

"You said we were weird?" She asked fighting a grin.

"Sure did," he smirked back. "Had a friend when I was younger who was Jewish, I think he was liberal. Anyways, he let me come to Temple with him a few times so…"

"Liberal," Seph said nodding her head. "And yeah, Jews are weird."

"Huh?" Kirk asked not quite getting what she was saying.

"His friend," Seph said nodding toward McCoy. "He was a Liberal Jew. They're the only ones who attend Temple. Orthodox, Conservatives, and Ultra-Orthodox attend Shul. I don't know what the others attend."

"Ok," Sulu said feeling a little overwhelmed at the amount of information he just received. "What are the holidays?"

"Well," Seph answered, "There is the Festival of the New Moons that happens every month…"

"Don't forget Pesach and the Feast of Matzot; Purim; Rosh Ha'Shanah; Yom Kippur; Sukkot; and Chanukah!" Dasa interrupted again. "Chanukah is my favorite. Cause its eight day long and you get presents _every_ night!"

"There are others like Yom Ha'Shoah the Holocaust Remembrance day, Yom Ha'Atzmaut the Israeli Independence Day, Shavuot, Tish B'Av, and Simchat Torah," Seph said. "And that's the list of _most_ of the Jewish holidays!" She said grinning. "There's a lot of them aren't there?"

"Yeah," Kirk said shaking his head. " _Waaaaaayyy_ too many of them."

"How many New Year's do ze Jews have?" Chekov asked.

"Three I think," Seph answered after thinking a moment. "Let's see, there is the Secular New Year, the first of Nisan the first month, and Rosh Ha'Shanah."

"Don't the Jews have thirteen month?" Kirk asked.

"That depends," Dasa said brightly. "Is it a leap year or not? If it's not a leap year it's twelve months and if it's a leap year we add a month."

"What are the months?" Uhura asked. "I've never met someone who could tell me all of them."

"Aunt Seph can I please…" Dasa started begging before being seeing Seph nod her head. "Ok, let's see. There's Nisan, Iyar, Sivan, Av, Tishrei, Adar, and…" She paused before looking back at Seph. "Aunt Seph, I'm forgetting some?"

"Tammuz is between Sivan and Av, then there's Elul, Tishrei, and you did get that one, Marcheshvan, Kislev, Tevet, Shevat, then Adar, and Adar 2 in leap years. I have been working with Dasa on the Jewish months and she's gotten half of them."

"The days are easier to remember though," Dasa said with a grin. "You have Yom Rishon, Yom Sheni, Yom Shlishi, Yom Revi'i, Yom Chamishi, Yom Shishi, and Shabbat. That translates to first day, second day, third day, fourth day, fifth day, sixth day, and rest."

"You add an Adar in a leap year?" Uhura asked going back to the topic before.

"Yep. Terrible if you happen to be born in that added month," Seph said before adding dryly, "Like me. Seriously," she said shaking her head. "Think about it. A leap year for the Jews occurs every two to three years equaling seven leap years in a nineteen year span. I was born in a leap year toward the end of Adar 2, which means if we're being exact in how many birthdays on the exact day we were born, I'm only six!"

"Wait," Kirk interjected, "What?"

"Jim," Seph said slowly, as if speaking to a child. "My birthday isn't for another five month and only then will I be eighteen. I need to be nineteen to have had my 'seventh' Jewish birthday." She smirk, "Talk about robbing the cradle."

"Ok," Sulu said shaking his head. "Jews are weird." Several others nodded their heads in agreement.

"Told ya so," McCoy said smugly…again.

"Yeah, I know," Seph said shrugging. "But, hey… What can I say? It's fun."

"Ok," Uhura said shaking her head. "I didn't know half of what you just said before, and I was one of the people that knew the most about Jews back where I grew-up. Wow! People knew so little back there."

"Think about it this way, Ny," Seph said gently. "That's not even half of what it is to be Jewish." At everyone's blank looks she continued, "In the Jewish schools it is believed that learning begins with a question. Until a student asks a question they cannot learn as they have no interest in what the rabbi or teacher has to offer. We also teach skills like logic, reasoning, debating, curiosity, and public speaking to our children. Parents are involved in their children's education even going outside the education system to teach them skills for their daily lives. We respect our elders for the knowledge, experience, and wisdom they had gathered in their lives and we seek their advice for the choices before us so we have the long term view they have gained through the years rather than the short term view we still retain as youths."

Seph tilted her head as she gazed towards the ceiling, "That probably explains why Jews get along well with Vulcans. We're really quite similar."

"That's…" McCoy trailed off.

"Yeah," Kirk muttered rolling his eyes. "Not to mention your logic is almost identical."

"Hey," Seph grinned. "At least we are logical. Unlike someone I will not name," she gave Kirk a pointed look.

"I'm logical," Kirk protested.

"Uh-Huh," McCoy said skeptically.

"My logic is very…" Kirk paused searching for a specific term.

"Illogical?" Spock supplied somewhat dryly.

"Yeah… wait what?" Kirk asked glancing around after everyone started laughing.

Suddenly the Enterprise lurched causing everyone to fall as a whole lot of lights started to flash. The sudden silence was broken by Kirk yelling, "What the hell?!"

 **YAY! Spock got to say something about Kirk's illogical approach! lol, let me know what you think... Please?**


	9. An Unlikely Hero

**A/N: Sorry it took so long to get this chapter up, it didn't want to be written. I hope you like it and it makes as much sense to you as it does to me. We'll get some more romance soon we just needed a little action as this _is_ the Enterprise.**

 _Nydon **:**_ **I'm glad you like this so far.**

 **Thank you all who have Favorited and Followed this story. I really appreciate your support.**

 **Have a great day-Seph**

* * *

Chapter Nine: An Unlikely Hero

 **Present Time… 0635 Hours…**

Kirk groaned as he opened his eyes before wincing at the pounding in his head. _What happened?_ He asked himself.

"Jim," a relieved voice said not that far from him. Kirk couldn't tell who it was with how much his head hurt.

"Daddy?" a scared voice asked from his other side.

"It's ok, baby, we'll figure something out," He replied trying to comfort Dasa with a smile that ended up a pain filled grimace instead.

"What did they want, Jim?" Seph asked from the other side of Dasa.

 _ **Flash Back… 1217 Hours… Previous Afternoon…**_

" _What the Hell?!" Kirk yelled._

" _Jim!" Seph reprimanded him sharply. "Language!"_

 _Kirk glanced at Seph surprised by her tone, until he saw Dasa gaping at him._

" _Sorry, baby," Kirk cringed at how badly he'd messed up. Everyone had agreed to_ _ **not**_ _use bad language around Dasa until she was at least fifteen, and he'd blown it._

" _Captain!" someone yelled from the other side of the bridge. "We have boarding parties on decks 3,4,6,7, and 8!"_

" _What?!" nearly everyone exclaimed simultaneously._

 _Before the security person could give any more details the Turbo Lift's doors opened to gun fire. All the security people went down before everyone realized they were under attack._

" _I have ship now," The alien they could only assume was the leader said in broken common._

 _Kirk opened his mouth to say something when Seph elbowed him in the side_ _ **really**_ _hard._

" _Which you Captain?" The alien asked in broken common._

" _I am," Kirk said still staring at Seph trying to figure out what she's elbowed him in the first place._

 _However, because Kirk was looking at Seph, he missed that expression that appeared on the aliens face. An expression that was not missed by most everyone else. Kirk glanced back to the alien as he spoke in what sounded like gibberish to his men. When he finished speaking the aliens behind him moved forward and separated Kirk form everyone else, before herding them to the Turbo Lift._

 _ **End Flash Back…**_

"Jim?"

He blinked quickly before focusing on Seph again.

"Jim?" Seph asked, again. "What did they want?"

"I don't know what they wanted. I… I don't remember…" He trailed off.

"What is the last thing you remember?" McCoy asked him.

"Um… Everyone being taken off the bridge?" his hesitant reply was not missed by the doctor.

"Jim that was over sixteen hours ago. Granted you were out for six of them here, but that's still ten hours you were with them. Are you honestly going to tell me you can't remember ten hours?!"

"I…" he trailed off as the door opened allowing five of the aliens to enter.

The crew eyed the intruders warily. Kirk's lack of memory was enough for the crew to not trust these people, who knew what they had done to their Captain?

Kirk glanced down at Dasa as she curled into his side. She was shaking, from fear or the cold temperature of the room he didn't know. He, none the less, wrapped his arm around her. As the aliens approached where they sat Kirk's arm tightened even more around Dasa in an effort to shield her from their sight. The aliens passed by without even looking at either of them.

Their circuit of the room finished when one of the motioned to a crewman glaring at them. Four of the aliens grabbed him and hauled him from the room as he fought them every step of the way.

When the door hiss closed two of the crewmen moved to it trying to see if it would open.

"It's locked," one of them said.

"Again," the other sighed.

"What?" Kirk asked still felling fuzzy headed from whatever they had done to him.

"They've been looking us in here," McCoy rolled his eyes. "Why do you think we're still here?"

"Uh," was Kirk's very eloquent response.

"Jim," Seph sighed.

Kirk opened his mouth to give his retort when he was diverted by Dasa sniffing.

"What's wrong, baby?" He asked looking down at Dasa.

"What if you'd died up there?" She asked looking Kirk with tear filled eyes. "What would've happened to me then?" Her voice dropped to a whisper at the end.

"I…" He trailed off.

"No!" Dasa yelled at him. "I lost my Mommy, and now I could've lost you too."

"I thought Ny was you Mommy now," Kirk said confused.

"But she's not my _real_ Mommy. And…" Dasa looked away from Kirk. "I only had a Mommy then she died and now I only have a Daddy. _Real_ families have both a Mommy and a Daddy." Her eyes begged Kirk to understand. "I never had a real family and I wanted one. I had a Mommy and then I didn't and it hurt. I wanted it to stop hurting. Mommy," she glanced at Uhura and smiled. "Mommy made it hurt less. So she became my new Mommy. And now I have both a Mommy and a Daddy and we're a real family. I just wish Mommy was my real mom too. But that can only happen if you marry her. What would happen to me if you died, Daddy? I wouldn't have a Mommy or a Daddy. I'd be alone." The tears Dasa had tried to hold in started to fall as she finished speaking.

"Oh, Sweetheart," Uhura said hugging Dasa to her as she started to cry.

"I…" Kirk's voice cracked. "I didn't know that. I'm sorry, baby," he said as he gently rubbed her back. "I'm trying, but I never had to take care of a kid before so I'm learning how to do this too. I've been trying to make sure I don't die either," He gave Dasa a watery grin. "Just ask your Uncle Bones."

"He's right, darlin'," McCoy said. "He's changed since you showed up."

Dasa gave them a shy smile, "Really?" she asked quietly.

"Really," McCoy said with a soft smile.

"So how 'bout we get out of here," Kirk said with a grin.

"How genius," McCoy gave Kirk a sour look. "The door's locked, or did you forget that too."

"Scotty."

"Aye Captin?"

"Is there a way to override the lock on the door?"

"Aye, but 'tis on the other side."

"Well there goes that idea," Uhura said with a sigh. Man was she tired from all this.

"Jim," Seph said her head shooting up.

"What?"

"Did Chayah ever tell you the story of when she was ten and the family took a trip off world?"

"Yeah… and?"

"The game of hide-and-go-seek. Do you remember where she had hidden herself?"

"Not off the top of my head, no. And how will that story help us now?."

"In the vents! She hid herself in the vents! The vents go everywhere on a ship, and if you're small enough you can easily work your way through them-"

"-And someone can use that to get to the other side of the door. But who's small enough?" Kirk asked.

"How big are the Enterprise's vents?" Seph asked turning to Scotty.

"Big enough for the wee lassie here to fit," he said nodding to Dasa. "But the rest of us be too big ta fit."

"I guess we can scratch that idea," Sulu said shaking his head.

"I can do it," Dasa said standing up.

"No. baby you're not going to. We'll find another way."

"But, Daddy…"

"I said no, Dasa."

"But…"

"No."

"But I can…"

"Hadassah Elizabeth Kirk, I said no. Do not ask again."

"Jim," Seph said stepping in to the beginning of a fight and heading it off. "I think she can do it. But I would like to save that for a last resort."

"It's too dangerous," Kirk said refusing to budge on his decision. "What if she got caught? They might hurt her or worse, kill her. I'm not putting her in that kind of danger."

Seph looked around the room meeting the eyes of most present. "Does anyone have any other ideas to add?"

As everyone started to shake their heads negative on the ideas Seph sighed. It looked like Dasa would have to go through the vents no matter what Jim might want. A sudden idea came to Seph that might just solve some of the problems here.

"What if Dasa went into the vents," Seph quickly held up a hand to forestall Kirk's objections. "And what if all she did was a little scouting. See what we're up against. No more, no less. She'll be safe in the vents. They can't reach here there. And if she's quiet," She gave Dasa a look at this. "They won't even know she's there."

"But…"

"That is a logical tactic," Spock said stepping into the discussion for the first time. "As Dasa would not leave the vents she would be protected and we would gain the Intel we need to make a better informed decision."

"Spock..." Kirk stared at him.

"I hate to agree with the Hobgoblin, but they're right, Jim," McCoy said grudgingly.

Dasa watched hopeful that her dad would let her do this. She could do this, she knew it. If only she could prove it.

"Fine," Kirk said giving in. "But only if she stays in the vents."

Dasa squealed in delight as she threw her arms around Kirk giving him a huge hug. "Thank you, Daddy. I'll stay in the vents. I promise!"

"Not to ruin ze mood," Chekov interjected. "But how vill she report back vhat she has found?"

The silence was so complete you could've heard a pin drop, if someone were to drop one that is.

"That's a good question," Someone said.

After some quick thinking Kirk asked, "Does anyone have their comms with them?" Three hands went up. "Good, give me two of them." Two of the comms were passed to Kirk.

He turned to Dasa, "Listen carefully. This button here lets you talk to me, so push and hold when you have something to tell us. Don't push this button as it locks onto the ship's internal comms. That means anyone on the enterprise can tap into the conversation and hear what you say. "

"Ok."

"And," Kirk said, stressing his point as much as he could. "Whatever you do… Stay in the vents. You got that?"

"Yes, Daddy," Dasa bounced excitedly.

"Ok then. Let's get you up there."

Scotty and Chekov removed the vent cover while Kirk was finishing giving the instructions to Dasa. When the vent cover was removed, Kirk and Sulu, helped lift her up to the vent so she could crawl in.

"Remember what I told you," Kirk reminded Dasa while he handed her the comm unit.

"I remember," Dasa said smiling before she turned and crawled farther into the vents.

"Do you think she'll be ok?" someone asked.

"I hope so," Kirk sighed. "You have no idea how much I hope so."


End file.
